India secured a three-match T20I series against Ireland with one match in hand in bat-bowling skills. In the second match, India defeated the Irish by 33 runs. Team India won by 2 runs in the first T20 due to rain.
After losing the toss and batting in Dublin, the opening pair of Yasaswi Jaiswal and Rituraj Gaikwad scored 29 runs. Jaiswal stopped for 18 runs off 11 balls. Tilak Verma was dismissed for 1 run in the second wicket.
Gaikwad and Sanju Samson laid the foundation for India’s big score by scoring 71 runs in 49 balls in the third wicket partnership. Gaikwad tasted his second half-century in T20 despite Samson getting back to 40 off 26 balls. He scored a maximum of 58 runs off 43 balls. At the end of the innings, Rinku Singh and Shivam Dubey gave a stormy batting. Anointed Rinku scored 38 runs off 21 balls. Dubey remained unbeaten on 22 runs from 16 balls.
Ireland lost 3 wickets for 31 runs and got under pressure at the beginning. Opener Andy Balbirnie tried to fight the middle order batters. For the fourth wicket, Balbirnie scored 35 runs from 28 balls with Curtis Campher and 52 runs from 30 balls with George Dockrell.
Campher stopped at 18 and Dockrell 13, but Balbirnie saw his tenth half-century in T20. Arshdeep Singh stopped Balbirni for 123 runs. Balbirnie completed his innings of 72 runs in 51 balls with 5 fours and 4 sixes. Ireland were knocked out of the match after Balbirnie’s dismissal. Indian captain Jasprit Bumrah-Prasidh Krishna and Ravi Bishnoi took 2 wickets each. Rinku was man of the match.
India-Ireland will play the third and last T20 of the series on August 23.
(21 August/MM)