For the first time in their history an Ireland cricket captain got his hand on a trophy while competing against a Test side. However William Porterfield’s smile in the post- match presentation yesterday evening must have hidden his frustration that he should have had both hands on the cup rather than sharing the moment with West Indies skipper Darren Sammy following West Indies narrow 11 run win which resulted in the series ending 1-1.
Having stunned the West Indies on Wednesday Ireland followed up yesterday by delivering to the reigning World T20 champions what should have been the knockout blow with their finest ever bowling performance against a top ranked team. There was an expectation that West Indies would react to Wednesday’s shock defeat, for which they were lambasted in the local media, by putting the Ireland upstarts to the sword. Instead they stuttered and staggered to 96 for 9 wickets, twenty runs less than their miserable total two days previously, as for the second successive game not one batsman reached twenty.
Sent in to bat after William Porterfield won the toss the West Indies batsmen yet again could not come to terms with the accurate and exceptionally disciplined bowling delivered by the men in green on a slow wicket. Apart from two dropped catches the fielding was superb and choked the life out of the normally free flowing calypso cavaliers. The pressure became unbearable forcing wild slogs and culminated in two run outs while attempting suicidal singles. Followers of this Ireland team will not be surprised that Porterfield was the razor sharp executioner on both occasions as Dwayne Bravo and Darren Sammy were sent scurrying back to the pavilion while trying to ignore the derision directed at them from the spectators. The run outs complimented a magnificent catch at backward point that Porterfield had taken earlier to dismiss Dwayne Smith.
Porterfield, apart from his excellent fielding, yet again demonstrated his now highly regarded strategic acumen in directing operations whether it be field placing’s or bowling changes. Two examples from yesterday illustrated his talent. He took the risk of introducing Stuart Thompson into the attack in the ninth over for his first T20 bowl and watched as a first ball wide was followed by a cover drive for four. Thompson settled a bit and had conceded just two singles and a two as he bowled the final ball of the over to Marlon Samuels whose flailing bat induced an edge to a wide delivery which was pouched by Gary Wilson. However recognising that Thompson was vulnerable Porterfield removed him from the attack to ensure that West Indies didn’t gain momentum and in doing so didn’t risk the potential destruction of young Thompson’s fragile confidence.
The second example was the way that Porterfield completely fooled Andre Russell who has been a scourge of Ireland bowlers in the past. Russell swings from the hip and Ireland must have feared the worst when off the second ball that he faced and before he had opened his account, Thompson dropped a fairly straightforward catch at mid-wicket off Kevin O’Brien’s bowling. Tim Murtagh was recalled to the attack and delivered four slowish bouncers that both Russell and Sammy attempted to pull to the mid-wicket boundary. As Murtagh prepared to deliver the fifth ball of the over Porterfield intervened and ostentatiously placed a second fielder at mid-wicket and laid down the challenge to Russell’s ego. As Murtagh ran in Russell set himself back in the crease to await the signalled delivery only for the bowler to deliver a pinpoint yorker which ripped out Russell’s stumps. Thompson’s dropped catch only cost eight runs although in hindsight were much more valuable than initially appeared.
For all of Porterfield’s genius it would have been redundant without the brilliance of his bowlers and in particular the performance of Alex Cusack. The Clontarf medium pacer was introduced into the attack in the powerplay and removed Andre Fletcher with his first ball and finished the over with that rarity in T20 cricket - a maiden. He got a wicket with his eighth delivery thanks to Porterfield’s aforementioned catch and had figures of 2 for 2 from his first two overs. Brought back for two of the final three overs of the innings he picked up another two wickets to finish with the remarkable figures of four overs, one maiden, four wickets for eleven runs and didn’t concede a single boundary while delivering 15 dot balls. These figures are the best in T20 internationals by an Associate bowler against a Full Member and the fourteenth best against Full Members by any bowler. When you add these figures to his analysis in the first T20, he took 6 wickets for 28 runs off his eight overs and deservedly was awarded Man of the Series.
Cusack was supported by Kevin O’Brien who had figures of 1 for 16 from his four overs and Tim Murtagh with 1 for 22. Surprisingly George Dockrell only bowled three overs which was one less than his concession of just fourteen runs seemed to warrant. In their 96 runs the West Indies only managed 4 boundary fours and 2 sixes which highlight the bowlers discipline.
A target of less than five runs an over in T20 cricket would only be regarded as a significant challenge if it had to be made on a difficult surface. While the wicket was slow and difficult to time the ball on it certainly didn’t have any demons in it. Ireland was faced with a less difficult prospect than the one that they were successful in on Wednesday. Then they survived the early loss of the opening batsmen thanks to the match winning partnership of Ed Joyce and Andrew Poynter but this time the loss of Porterfield and Stirling could not be counteracted.
Paul Stirling and William Porterfield are the best opening partnership that Ireland has ever produced and have over 10,000 runs between while batting for their country. In Abu Dhabi last November, in the qualifying tournament for the World T20 Championship next month in Bangladesh, both batsmen batted with a freedom and purpose that was instrumental in propelling Ireland to a decisive Tournament success. However since they arrived in Trinidad in January neither man has looked in any sort of form with the bat. The fluency of last November has been replaced with uncertainty and indecision. While West Indies have a decent bowling attack only the world number one ranked T20 bowler, Sunil Narine, is genuine world class. See off his four overs and a target of 97 should be readily achievable. No big shots were required unless a bad ball came along and playing straight and pushing the singles into gaps would have been sufficient.
Unfortunately Stirling, who is at his imperious best when playing through the V, succumbed to leg side heaves. On Wednesday he got caught on the leg boundary and last night lost his off stump. Porterfield in both matches had difficulty reading the length of Badree and last night had his stumps disturbed by a straight ball.
After the West Indies innings Ed Joyce must have anticipated celebrating his 100th cap for Ireland with an historic series win. Initially it looked as if he and Gary Wilson were going to break the back of the target until, when on ten, he got a good delivery from Narine and his edge was sharply snapped up by Sammy. Poynter soon followed, out slapping a Sammy full toss to extra cover, and the West Indies captain then bowled Kevin O’Brien for three. Gary Wilson did everything in his power to see the team home but there were few runs coming from the other end and he had no choice but to try and find the boundary. He finally perished skying a return catch to Bravo for 35 off just 39 balls and his controlled innings demonstrated what a better application from his colleagues could have achieved.
The innings then petered out and in the end Ireland finished on 85 for 8 wickets having hit seven boundaries. A great opportunity slipped through Ireland’s hands and while they have yet again demonstrated that they can compete with the best, they seem to lack the confidence rather than the ability to regularly close out winning chances against the top sides. The reality is that if you aspire to compete with the best, and Ireland do and can, then they have to expect to be judged by those standards.
To win tight matches such as this you also must have your best players on the park. I have written on a number of occasions, particularly in my Cricket Europe Ireland column, about the seemingly unravelling relationship between Phil Simmons and Niall O’Brien. The last T20 match that O’Brien played in was in Abu Dhabi against Uganda when he scored 35 from 41 balls in a game Ireland won in a canter. Presumably this was deemed too slow as he was dropped and hasn’t been picked since for a T20 encounter. However he top scored in the Intercontinental Cup final in December and was the best batsman for Ireland in the Regional Super 50 competition earlier this month. Yet the man who has the second best average of Ireland’s all time aggregate run scorers cannot get a place in this side. While Stuart Thompson is a promising player he doesn’t have the battle hardened experience of O’Brien and given that Thompson only was entrusted with one over in the two games it has to be presumed that he was selected primarily for his batting. Having seen on Wednesday that this was a slow scoring wicket and that tight defence and the ability to rotate the strike without taking undue risks were essential components of success it defies belief that O’Brien was not selected last night whatever about Wednesday’s match. 35 off 41 balls last night would have been manna from heaven.
Tomorrow the format changes to the 50 over game and perhaps it is time to use this game as early preparation for the World Cup in Australasia this time next year. Apart from the obvious choice of Niall O’Brien, a look at Craig Young and Andy McBrine could be useful.
One final observation. Listening to the West Indian commentary on the stream last night endangered the wellbeing of my laptop. During the Jack Charlton years, Eamon Dunphy courted controversy which he categorised some in the print media as “fans with typewriters” and last night I would regard the commentary as being carried out by clowns with microphones. One of them couldn’t even get William Porterfield’s name right as he continually referred to him as Portersfield while they continually disparaged the Ireland skill levels. One of them seemed to suggest that he played with Jackie Hendricks, the former West Indian wicketkeeper, so given that Hendricks is eighty I suspect that the commentator is not improving with age.
Worst of all was the constant reference to Ireland as minnows which was said in increasingly higher pitched tones as each West Indian wicket fell. There is only one way to answer the minnows charge and while one opportunity may have been lost yesterday there will be many more in the future.
