(Cricket news) Lorcan Tucker did the deed with the bat and a fiery bowling by Curtis Campher led Ireland to victory in the second T20I of the Dafabet USA v Ireland Men’s International Series.

Tucker scored his second consecutive half-century as he hit nine boundaries and three maximums in a 56 ball stay that held together the Irish batters and helped post a defendable target. Tucker recorded his highest international score of 84 as this is the second time in twelve months he has scored above 80.

Campher then did the trick with the ball as he bowled an aggressive spell, effecting a run out from his own bowling to claim the first wicket before capturing four wickets in which three of the wickets came in the 18th over of the innings.

After losing the toss and being sent in to bat under the lights, Ireland captain Andrew Balbirnie and opening partner Paul Stirling looked to try and set a more dominating tone for the Irish batting unit to overcome their defeat earlier, with Stirling striking the first ball to the boundary. However, just five balls later Ireland’s talisman was sent back for 5 runs.

Balbirnie smacked two boundaries through the off-side off Saurabh Netravalkar, but fell for a short ball for the second time in a row, out for 10. Tucker came in at no.3 for only the second time, then took control of the innings. His previous innings was one had tentative shot play and today Tucker was more fluent in his strokeplay. US pacer Muhammad Ali Khan got hit for a six over mid-on and a chipped shot off his pads over square leg for four from Khan’s first over.

The Pembroke and Leinster Lightning batter notched up his half-century in 32 balls, and looked comfortable throughout. Where Tucker timed the ball well, and scored at a strike rate of 150 over his innings, the rest of the Irish batters seemed to struggle, only Curtis Campher (17) and Simi Singh (13) scored above 10  in the remainder of the innings.

Tucker had his moments of good fortune, after being dropped twice but looked to threaten a possible century before falling in the 19th over of the innings trying to reverse sweep a yorker from Netravalkar.

Ryan Scott came up the order to open the US innings and immediately hit boundaries against Mark Adair. However, a brilliant piece of fielding off his own bowling saw Campher run Scott out for 11 and the Irish side got its first breakthrough.

Ritwik Behera was caught by Shane Getkate by Adair in the 9th over, captain Monank Patel fell for 26 to give Ben White his first wicket.

Gajanand Singh, who was the Player of the Match yesterday, again looked confident while hitting 23 from 20 balls, but fell to Campher just when he was looking to attack. With the run rate required climbing steadily towards two runs a ball, Adair bowled well under pressure in the death overs taking the pace off the ball and conceding just four runs from the 16th over.

The 18th over by Campher was a true rollercoaster which had a no-ball six, a second six, and then three wickets in five balls separated by a wide saw USA needing 28 from the last two overs. Barry McCarthy and Adair were on top to bowl out the final 12 balls, and Ireland were victorious by 9 runs. The series finished level at 1-1.

Tucker, named Player of the Match and Player of the Series for his 141 runs across the two matches, said: “It was great to get an opportunity to bat that high in the order – I haven’t batted at 3 in T20s for Ireland before. Yesterday was the first game I had played in a while and I felt a bit scratchy, but I felt more comfortable, and played more fluently today.

“When it’s only 150 on the board and a ground with small enough boundaries, you want to take your chances and I think we did that really well in the field. We took wickets at key moments and closed the game out really well.”

Andrew Balbirnie said: “The fighting spirit we wanted was there today – it still wasn’t a great performance but we got over the line and we showed that character that we want to instill into the group. “We have a lot of T20 cricket coming up, and a World Cup qualifier soon where we’ll need to take a look at ourselves and see where we can improve, but Lorcan was outstanding – he didn’t think he’d be batting three at the start of the series but he’s someone we think is an exciting cricketer and I thought that was really impressive innings today. “We knew the USA would be a good team, it’s been a hard fought series – we haven’t played our best today, but we still found a way, and that’s a good sign.”

Match Summary  

USA Men v Ireland Men, 2nd T20I, Broward County Stadium, Florida

Ireland 150 (18.5 overs: L Tucker 84; S Netravalkar 3-33)

USA 141-7 (20 overs: S Modani 27; C Campher 4-25)  

Ireland Men won by 9 runs

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