Irish Cricket Thread

After the traditional early collapse to the first innings, the middle and tail orders salvaged some pride from 7/4 to just 180 runs short. So on Day 4, the first objective was to stay in the game. To be fair, most of the players got the memo, except Joyce who got himself needlessly run out early on, and Balbirnie who got himself the rather unwanted Double Duck a few minutes later. 2 wickets later, we got to lunch 58 runs short. So what is lunch like in Malahide Cricket Club? 3 food vans, an alcohol tent, an airline tent, and a handful of park benches for the peckish to refuel for the long sessions ahead. And that's about it. 

Still in matchsaving mode, we inched our way ever closer to making the tourists bat again. After Amir took his 100th Test wicket, eventually we got there, then the records started popping up. First 50 in a Ireland Test Match, first century, first hundred partnership, first 50 from a bowler. Then the singing started in the stands, while LarryTheLeprechaun let us all know what he made of Sarfraz's captaincy. He wasn't the only one though. Back in the likes of Lahore and Islamabad, (4 hours ahead of Malahide) where cricket is taken rather more seriously than here, news came through that their fans were getting more and more restless with how Pakistan's task was developing from a stroll in the park to a competitive test match.

While all this was going on, KOB got his century, he's only waited 7 years since his last in Bangalore. There was no luck about it though, it was the kind of high class batting that a few higher up the order should be able to muster, instead of collapsing in a heap like they do, far too often. While Kane was able to chip in with a solid if unspectacular 8, from a 90 minute long slog.

Credit to Cricket Ireland who have organised everything very well. Also, €10 to watch KOB put a century together was excellent value for money. And another tenner could have you watching even more history today, so get yourself down to Malahide if you can. Apparantly, the away fans don't fancy the idea of their side having to chase just 150 down on the last day of a Test Match, let's see if they fancy another ton on top of that. 

So after 122 Overs and a great 4th Day, we've saved the game. The next task is to go and win it, and make even more history. It may not look likely atm, but it looks a lot more likely than it did 24 hours ago.

Another hundred runs on the board, and we might well have had a different outcome. 

What will be interesting will be if teams touring England will see a test game against Ireland as more beneficial than a county warm up game which has been the tradition.

It's going to rain on the Tuesday...