Ireland continue Jamaica love affair

Minnows shock West Indies in first T20 encounter.

KINGSTON, JAMAICA: Ireland added to their list of giant-killing victories with a six-wicket win over World Twenty20 champions West Indies in the first T20 international at Jamaica’s Sabina Park on Wednesday.

It was at the Kingston venue where they had dramatically defeated Pakistan in a St Patrick’s Day 50-over World Cup match back in 2007.

And seven years on from that success, Ireland -- the leading non-Test cricket nation -- upset one of the sport’s ‘big boys’ once again, with former England batsman Ed Joyce making a decisive 40 not out.

After the West Indies won the toss and batted, a good all-round effort in the field saw the hosts restricted to 116 for eight in their 20 overs.

Tim Murtagh, Alex Cusack and Kevin O’Brien took two wickets apiece, with Cusack capturing the prize scalp of danger man Chris Gayle for a meagre innings top score of 18.

The visitors coached by former West Indies batsman Phil Simmons, collapsed to eight for two in reply, losing both openers cheaply, before Joyce, the captain of English county side Sussex, and Andrew Poynter steadied the innings.

Joyce’s runs came off 49 balls, and it was left to Kevin O’Brien -- just one of two survivors from the team that beat Pakistan at Sabina Park in 2007 -- to hit the winning runs as the Irish finished on 117 for four with five balls to spare.

“It was obviously brilliant,” said Joyce as the visitors took a 1-0 lead in the two-match series ahead of Friday’s second T20 at Sabina Park and a standalone 50-over one-day game there on Sunday.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 21^st, 2014.

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