West Indies v Ireland

West Indies Crush Ireland
The Sabina Park in Jamaica witnessed the Group D match between hosts West Indies and Ireland. This match was a mere formality as both these teams had already qualified for the final. However, this match was considered as a great outing for both the teams to get their bearings right before the start of the next round.

Ireland Get's Lucky with the Toss
Ireland got lucky with the toss after the stand-in Irish skipper WK McCallan won the toss and decided to bat first on a decent wicket. Ireland Captain Trent Johnston did not feature in the match due to a shoulder injury. This seemed like a good decision as it gave Irish the opportunity to put a score on the board and pressurize the opposition and force yet another surprising victory.

Ireland Off to a Stumbling Start
Ireland did not get off to the start that it was hoping for. The Irish opener William Porterfield got out without troubling the scorers leaving Ireland at 3 for 1. After Porterfield’s exit, the other Irish opener JP Bray and EJG Morgan tried to stabilize the Irish innings and put on a decent partnership of 58 runs. With Ireland’s score at 61, Morgan too was back in the dressing room at a personal score of 18. Thereafter, Ireland could not put on a single solid partnership and kept losing wickets at regular intervals. Bray top scored with 41 runs with 7 sizzling hits to the boundary. With Ireland score at 161 for 6 wkts at 45.2 overs, the match was stopped for an hour due to light rain. This resulted in shortening each inning by 2 overs.

Ireland’s Poor Batting Display
None of the Irish batsmen could stand up to the might of the West Indian bowlers. The West Indies were spot on with their bowling and followed perfect line and length that restricted Irish flow of runs. Also, the West Indian bowlers were supported with good ground fielding by the West Indian fielders. All the bowlers picked up wickets among themselves. For the West Indies, Powell, Bravo and Gayle picked up 2 wickets each while JE Taylor and Bradshaw picked up 1 wicket each. Due to this collective effort, Ireland could manage only 183 from 48 overs with the loss of 8 wickets.

Caribbean Reply
Due to the stoppage of play, the Duckworth/Lewis system came into play This stoppage deprived the Irish team of 4.8% of their resources. Under the Duckworth-Lewis method of revising the target; the Irish team having startd with 100%, have used 100-48=95.2% of their resources. The West Indies team will play 48 overs--thus the resourcs percentage available to them is 98.1%, which is 2.9% more than that available to the Irish team.So, West Indies is set a target which is 2.9% of runs (rounded up) more than 183.i.e 183+2.9% of 238=183+6.815 rounded in=190 runs in 48 overs. This total never seemed challenging for the Caribbeans. Hence, even after the explosive West Indian opener Chris Gayle got out cheaply, the West Indies never looked in any trouble. It was the experienced Shivnarine Chanderpaul who almost single handedly took West Indies home. Chanderpaul hit a classy century to see West Indies home and remained unbeaten on 102 from 113 balls. His innings comprised of 10 classic boundaries and 4 towering sixes. This was Chanderpaul’s third one-day century in his last seven appearances. Chanderpaul first established a partnership of 119 runs with Ramnaresh Sarwan. This partnership virtually sealed the fate for Ireland in the match. Sarwan fell for a personal score of 36 runs. Thereafter Chanderpaul and Marlon Samuels ensured that West Indies reached home without any hiccups. Samuels finished the match in great style by hitting a huge six over midwicket. The Irish bowling did not have much to be proud of. The only wicket takers for Ireland were D Langford-Smith who picked up the all-important wicket of Chris Gayle while the other wicket taker was the stand in skipper WK McCallan who dismissed Sarwan.

Caribbean Win in Style
West Indies reached the total with 59 balls to spare and eight wickets in hand. The Man of the Match was an obvious choice, Shivnarine Chanderpaul. This win ensured that West Indies went into the Super 8 by winning all its first round games.