BELFAST – Following Ireland’s loss in the first T20 International against South Africa on Monday, the action now moves from Malahide to Stormont – a place all-rounder Mark Adair has very fond memories.
Speaking ahead of training, Adair said:
“I’ve grown up playing around Stormont, I remember even helping out the groundsman with the covers when I was young. In fact, my first live game of cricket was Ireland v England at Stormont where I was helping to pull the covers – so it will be nice to be back playing there again.”
“It’s been great to be back playing in front of crowds too. When Bal [Andrew Balbirnie] got his hundred the other day you saw the entire ground stand up for him. I don’t want to say it was emotional, but you got that tingling feeling once again. It gives us hope that in the not-too-distant future when teams like this come over we’ll once more see big crowds – and hopefully we’ll put in a performance against them.”
“T20 cricket can be a complicated game at times, but from game one we know that if we just closed out their innings better, and started ours a bit better, we could have been looking at 150 plays 150. We just need to simplify our game plan – I don’t think we need to do anything too differently, we just need to be aware of how we go about executing our plans and getting people within the team involved.”
The second T20 International between Ireland Men and South Africa Men begins tomorrow at 4pm, with South Africa leading 1-0 in the three match series.
WHERE TO WATCH THE SERIES
– Ireland/UK: BT Sport
– North America: Willow
– Middle East / North Africa: Etisalat
– Sub-Saharan Africa: SuperSport
– India: Fancode
– Australia: Fox Sports
– New Zealand: Sky NZ
FIXTURES
The series schedule is:
• 19 July: Ireland v South Africa, 1st T20I (Malahide, scorecard)
• 22 July: Ireland v South Africa, 2nd T20I (Stormont, 4pm)
• 24 July: Ireland v South Africa, 3rd T20I (Stormont, 4pm)
IRELAND MEN’S SQUAD
Andrew Balbirnie (captain), Mark Adair, George Dockrell, Stephen Doheny, Shane Getkate, Josh Little, Barry McCarthy, William McClintock, Kevin O’Brien, Simi Singh, Paul Stirling, Harry Tector, Lorcan Tucker, Ben White, Craig Young.
Craig Easdown
Mark Adair celebrates his first wicket in the first T20I
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Connaught
