Ireland has announced a 14 member squad for the two T20I matches to be played against India on 27th June and 29th June. Gary Wilson would lead squad after William Porterfield decided to step down from captaincy.
William Porterfield, Paul Stirling, Kevin O Brien, Gary Wilson, Andrew Balbirinie, Stuart Poynter, Jame Shannon and Simi Singh would the batting duties.
Stuart Thompson, Boyd Rankin, Peter Chase, Kevin O Brien, Joshua Little would do the pace bowling duties. Geroge Dockrell, Andrew McBrine would comprise of spin bowling. Ireland is currently last in the latest ICC T20I rankings.
Ireland will face a tough India challenge. They have played 61 T20I matches and won 26, losing 29 matches with a win percentage of 47.27. In the recently concluded T20I series against Scotland and Netherlands, Ireland won only 1 match and one match was tied with Scotland. They lost both matches against Netherlands by just 4 runs.
India will be favourites to win the series. It will be a challenge for the new captain Gary Wilson to lead the team. Ireland has picked a young team to give experience to them at the international stage.
In 2019, Ireland will be playing the qualifying tournament and hope to qualify for the main tournament in 2020 World T20 to be held in Australia.
In One day international format, Ireland had shocked major teams in World Cup tournaments. In 2007, Ireland shocked Pakistan, in 2011 World Cup Ireland shocked England and in 2015 50 over World, Ireland smashed two time World Champions West Indies.
Ireland played their first test match on 11th May 2018 against Pakistan after getting the full member nation last year. The Ireland team showed great fighting spirit despite losing the match by 5 wickets.
Ireland T20I squad: William Porterfield, Paul Stirling, Kevin O Brien, Gary Wilson (C), Andrew Balbirnie, Peter Chase, Kevin O Brien, Andrew McBrine, Stuart Poynter (WK), Josh Little, George Dockrell, Boyd Rankin, Stuart Thompson, Simi Singh, James Shannon.
Schedule
1st T20I: Ireland vs. India ( Malahide, Dublin)- 27th June
2nd T20I: Ireland vs. India ( Malahide, Dublin)- 29th June