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After arriving in Dubai, Ed Joyce had a quick chat with the ICC about the upcoming tri-series with Scotland and Afghanistan as well as the ICC World Cup.
Talking about the World Cup, Joyce said “it’s the biggest event you can play in and we’re really excited about it because we see it as a great opportunity to get through to a quarter final and beyond”.

The 15-man Word Cup squad, and five support bowlers, arrived in Dubai on Monday ahead of their first match in the tri-series on January 10th, and Joyce “can’t wait to get started” and play against a “very dangerous” Afghanistan team and a Scotland side that “have improved out of all sight” in recent years.

Supporters in Ireland are currently battling the wind, rain and cold of home, and the significance of being away from that is not lost on Joyce.

“We’re going to work as hard as we can and get as much out of it as we can because obviously the winter weather at home doesn’t particularly lend itself to cricket practice.

“It’s really good preparation for us going in to the World Cup…it should be a good tri-series.”

On the wider issue of associate cricket there is a real feeling that there is a need to move away from the notion that associate teams are not strong enough to compete on the world stage.

“Calling it associate cricket sort of propagates the notion that we’re somehow inferior to the other sides, I think we’re all good sides and we’ve got good potential to beat anyone on our day.

“So I’d like to think we’d be all gunning for a quarter final spot and it would be great to see a couple of us get through to that and really show the world how the teams outside the top ten are improving and to really showcase cricket beyond those teams.”

There was also some discussion about a young player who has “huge potential” and the two seam bowlers looking to fill the space left by Trent Johnston and Boyd Ranking moving on. To find out who Ed was talking about you can listen to the full interview (3 minutes) below.

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