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Ahead of Ireland’s first ODI of 2015, coach Phil Simmons and all-rounder John Mooney spoke to the ICC about the upcoming tri-series and Ireland’s preparation for the ICC World Cup.
Ahead of Ireland’s first ODI of 2015, coach Phil Simmons and John Mooney spoke to the ICC about the upcoming tri-series and Ireland’s preparation for the ICC World Cup.
With Afghanistan comprehensively beating Scotland in their opening match of the tri-series, Ireland will have to be at their best when the two sides meet tomorrow. Mooney, who will be playing in his third World Cup for Ireland, is well aware of the threat Afghanistan pose, but is still looking forward to the match.

“They’re a really strong side with what seems to be a lot of strength and depth – every time we come up against them they’ve got new players we haven’t really heard much about and they’re just a really tough side.

“They play a brand of cricket that’s exciting and I actually really like playing against the Afghans, they’re a really tough side and a great bunch of lads as well.”

The series will see Ireland play Scotland as well as Afghanistan in a competitive tri-series, and Simmons spoke about the importance of the series in Dubai. “It’s a vital series as we look to fine-tune our preparations for the ICC Cricket World Cup 2015.

“We’ve just announced our World Cup 15, so there will be a lot of healthy competition within our squad to state their case for a place in the starting line-up.

“We’ve developed a great rivalry over the years with both Scotland and Afghanistan and I’m certain it’ll be a tough, keenly contested tri-series, and one which we’re all looking forward to,” he concluded.

Whilst the tri-series in Dubai is the first on-field action since the World Cup squad was announced earlier this week, it is far from the start of preparation, with an acclimatisation tour to Australia and New Zealand in the Autumn, and a November training camp in Dubai having a real positive impact, especially the two matches against New Zealand A at the end of that trip.

“I think they’ll turn out to be really crucial, the training itself was really intense for a week and a half, two weeks building up to those games and that kiwi side was packed full of internationals – full internationals, test players and their bowling attack especially – they’ve got a great crop of bowlers there at the minute, so to finish with those two games was really good.” said Mooney.

“We walked away from both of them really pleased with how we played, we let ourselves down a bit with the bat in the second game and with the ball in little areas, but in general we played really good cricket for the whole lot of those two games.”

Whilst the games in Dubai will not be broadcast live, you can follow each match live on our website and on twitter @irelandcricket

You can listen to the full interview with John Mooney below

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