Afghanistan continued their remarkable rise in world cricket today with a thrilling 13-run victory over Ireland in their opening Twenty20 World Cup qualifier in Dubai.
The war-torn nation took three wickets from the final three deliveries of the match to dismiss Ireland for 126 and go top of Group A ahead of their match against Scotland tomorrow.
Scotland suffered a six-wicket defeat by USA, Afghanistan's opponents in an intriguing fixture on Thursday.
Afghanistan, who were playing in the Division 5 of the World Cricket League two years ago, have since climbed to the top flight and came within one win of qualifying for the 2011 World Cup last AprilToday's win boosts their chances of playing the sport's biggest nations at Twenty20 World Cup in the Caribbean next month.
William Porterfield, the Ireland captain, won the toss and enjoyed an excellent start when Trent Johnston claimed the wickets of Karim Sadiq and Shafiquallah to reduce Afghanistan for 14-2.
However, Mohammed Nabi and Noor Ali, the opening batsman, eventually steadied the innings with scores of 43 and 42 respectively as their side reached 139-8 from their 20 overs.
After losing opening batsman Niall O'Brien cheaply, Ireland made decent progress at the start of their innings thanks to Paul Stirling and Porterfield, the captain scoring 35 from 28 deliveries.
The momentum turned when Karim Sadiq struck twice in the seventh over, removing Porterfied and Andrew Botha to leave Ireland on 52-3, and swung further towards Afghanistan when Stirling was dismissed two overs later.
Anchoring the tail by scoring 21 from 18 deliveries, Johnston wrested back the initiative to the Ireland, leaving them needing 14 runs to win when he was caught out from the final ball of the penultimate over.
However, his team-mates failed to capitalise, with Peter Connell run out from the first ball of the final over and John Mooney bowled from the next to give Afghanistan a memorable win.
Source:The Times
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