HOBART, 19 Oct: Two-time champion West Indies and Ireland rebounded from their opening losses at the Twenty20 World Cup with emphatic victories on Wednesday to open up Group B.
\nCurtis Campher belted an unbeaten 72 from 32 deliveries to lead Ireland to a six-wicket win over Scotland.
\nLater in the night game, fast bowler Alzarri Joseph picked up 4-16 and led West Indies to a 31-run win over Zimbabwe, which was bowled out for 122 with 10 balls to spare.
\nThat leaves all four teams in Group B with two points each from two matches. The winners of West Indies vs. Ireland and Zimbabwe vs. Scotland on Friday will advance to the Super 12.
\nScotland upset two-time champion West Indies in the group opener on Monday and was in control of its second game as Ireland struggled at 61-4 in the 10th over chasing 177 to win.
\nThat\u2019s where Campher and George Dockrell dug in, combining in an unbroken 119-run fifth-wicket stand that turned the game around at Bellerive Oval.
\nIreland steadily eroded the target to the point where the equation was 12 runs needed from the last 12 balls. Campher ensured the victory, and posted Ireland\u2019s highest-ever individual score at the T20 World Cup, with three straight boundaries to lift the total to 180-4 and finish off the 19th over. Dockrell finished unbeaten on 39 from 27 balls.
\nCampher said his aim when Ireland lost two wicket within five deliveries in the ninth and 10th overs was just to back himself.
\n\u201cI had a clear game plan: just take the game deep, go with my options,\u201d he said. \u201cLucky today was my day.\u201d
\nIreland skipper Andy Balbirnie said his team was motivated after getting close too many times but not quite getting the result.
\n\u201cIt was pretty special, I can\u2019t remember an important partnership as that,\u201d he said of the Campher-Dockrell stand. \u201cWe started the tour-nament a bit disappointingly. To be able to drag it back and stay in this competition is really important for us.\u201d
\nAfter losing George Munsey in the second over, Scotland\u2019s batting was solid.
\nMichael Jones posted 86 from 55 deliveries with six boundaries and four sixes, including one onto the stadium roof.
\nHe shared a 59-run stand with Matthew Cross (29) and 77 with skipper Richie Berrington (37) to set the foundations for Scotland\u2019s total of 176-5.
\n\u201cWe certainly put Ireland under pressure early on,\u201d Berrington said. \u201cYou\u2019ve got to give Ireland credit. Exceptional knock from Curtis Campher.
\n\u201cThese group situations are never straight forward. We\u2019ll come back strong in the last game against Zimbabwe.\u201d
\nOff-spinner Sikandar Raza picked up 3-19 and strangled the West Indies in the middle overs before it reached 153-7 after electing to bat first.
\nOpening batter Johnson Charles top-scored with 45 off 36 balls before West Indies lost wickets in cluster and slipped to 101-6 in 14 overs.
\nWest Indies was going along nicely at 90-2 before it lost four wickets within two overs. Captain Nicholas Pooran gave a tame return catch to Sean Williams and three balls later Charles was run out. Raza then had Shamarh Brooks leg before wicket for zero before Jason Holder also perished by offering a simple catch back to Raza.
\nZimbabwe\u2019s aggression led to its downfall as its batters continued to look for big hits before getting dismissed for 122 in 18.2 overs.
\nJoseph picked up two wickets inside the batting powerplay through his relentless pace before clean bowling the threatening Luke Jongwe (29) in his return spell.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s not just now but since the beginning of the year he\u2019s (Joseph) been our best bowler in T20 cricket,\u201d Pooran said. \u201cBowling at 140-plus, getting wickets for us and bringing that energy, it\u2019s an exciting time for West Indies cricket.\u201d
\nHolder also finished with impressive figures of 3-12 as he claimed the last wicket of Tendai Chatara.
\nIndia\u2019s warmup game against New Zealand and Bangladesh\u2019s warmup game against South Africa didn\u2019t get started at the Gabba because of persistent rain, one of three practice games in Brisbane that were either curtailed or abandoned.
\nMohammad Nabi scored an unbeaten 51 in Afghanistan\u2019s 154-6 against Pakistan. The second innings lasted 2.2 overs, with Pakistan on 19 without loss, before the match was stopped because of rain.
\nIndia and Pakistan are scheduled to meet Sunday in the Super 12 round in front of a capacity crowd at the Melbourne Cricket Ground. Defending champion Australia and New Zealand meet in a grand final rematch on Saturday to open the second phase of the tournament. (PTI)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
HOBART, 19 Oct: Two-time champion West Indies and Ireland rebounded from their opening losses at the Twenty20 World Cup with emphatic victories on Wednesday to open up Group B. Curtis Campher belted an unbeaten 72 from 32 deliveries to lead Ireland to a six-wicket win over Scotland. Later in the night game, fast bowler Alzarri […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-203153","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=203153"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/203153\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=203153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=203153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=203153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}