ICC World Twenty20 2010

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From the Cricket Ireland website:

Men’s squads confirmed for ICC World Twenty20 2010[/b]

All 12 men’s squads for the ICC World Twenty20 2010 have now been confirmed with the very best players in the world all getting ready for the big event, which gets underway in the West Indies later this month.

Defending champion Pakistan will be led by Shahid Afridi and features a strong line-up that includes the experience of Misbah-ul-Haq, Mohammed Asif, Abdul Razzaq and Umar Gul along with the burgeoning talents of Umar Akmal, Saeed Ajmal and Mohammed Aamer.

One side that will be bursting to succeed during the tournament will be host West Indies, led by the always-exciting Chris Gayle. With the men from the Caribbean based in Guyana for its two matches in the group stage, it will be a particular incentive for the likes of Ramnaresh Sarwan, Shivnarine Chanderpaul and Narsingh Deonarine to perform well in front of their adoring home support.

India will be coming into the event with plenty of Twenty20 practice with most of its players having been taking part in the Indian Premier League. The 2007 champion will again be led by wicketkeeper-batsman Mahendra Singh Dhoni and is not short on thrilling players in the form Virender Sehwag, Yuvraj Singh, Zaheer Khan, Yusuf Pathan and others.

The two teams that qualified for the event, Afghanistan and Ireland, will be anxious to show the world they are not there simply to make up the numbers. The Afghanis were playing in Division 5 of the Pepsi ICC World Cricket League less than two years ago and now find themselves up against India and South Africa in Group C, illustrating the sort of opportunities awaiting Associate and Affiliate teams with talent and ambition.

Returning to the scene of their triumphs in the ICC Cricket World Cup 2007, William Porterfield’s Ireland will want to reproduce the sort of form that saw them reach the last eight of that tournament and with mouth-watering ties against the host and near-neighbour England in the offing, they’ll be confident of causing another upset or two.

The action gets underway in Guyana on 30 April with the final taking place in Kensington Oval, Barbados on 16 May. St Lucia is the other venue for the men’s event with the early stages of the women’s tournament taking place in St Kitts.

All the men’s squads are listed below:

Afghanistan: Nawroz Mangal (captain), Mohammad Nabi, Karim Sadiq, Mirwais Ashraf, Rais Ahmadzai, Dawlat Ahmadzai, Mohammad Shahzad, Hamid Hassan, Samiullah Shinwari, Noor Ali, Asghar Stanikzai, Shahpoor Zadran, Shabir Noori, Sayed Nasrat, Shafiq Shafaq.

Australia: Michael Clarke (captain), Dan Christian, Brad Haddin, Nathan Hauritz, David Hussey, Michael Hussey, Mitchell Johnson, Brett Lee, Dirk Nannes, Tim Paine, Steven Smith, Shaun Tait, David Warner, Shane Watson, Cameron White.

Bangladesh: Shakib Al Hasan (captain), Mushfiqur Rahim, Tamim Iqbal, Imrul Kayes, Mohammad Ashraful, Aftab Ahmed, Mahmudullah, Naeem Islam, Mashrafe Mortaza, Abdur Razzak, Shafiul Islam, Rubel Hossain, Syed Rasel, Suhrawadi Shuvo, Jahurul Islam.

England: Paul Collingwood (captain), James Anderson, Ravi Bopara, Tim Bresnan, Stuart Broad, Craig Kieswetter, Michael Lumb, Eoin Morgan, Kevin Pietersen, Ajmal Shahzad, Ryan Sidebottom, Graeme Swann, James Tredwell, Luke Wright, Michael Yardy.

India: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (captain), Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Yuvraj Singh, Suresh Raina, Yusuf Pathan, Dinesh Karthik, Ravindra Jadeja, Zaheer Khan, Praveen Kumar, Ashish Nehra, Harbhajan Singh, Piyush Chawla, Vinay Kumar, Rohit Sharma.

Ireland: William Porterfield (captain), Peter Connell, Alex Cusack, George Dockrell, Trent Johnston, Nigel Jones, Gary Kidd, John Mooney, Kevin O’Brien, Niall O’Brien, Boyd Rankin, Paul Stirling, Andrew White, Gary Wilson.

New Zealand: Daniel Vettori (captain), Brendon McCullum, Jesse Ryder, Martin Guptill, Ross Taylor, Scott Styris, Aaron Redmond, Jacob Oram, Gareth Hopkins, Rob Nicol, Nathan McCullum, Kyle Mills, Tim Southee, Shane Bond, Ian Butler.

Pakistan: Shahid Afridi (captain), Salman Butt, Mohammad Hafeez, Khalid Latif, Misbah-ul-Haq, Fawad Alam, Umar Akmal, Abdul Razzaq, Yasir Arafat, Hammad Azam, Kamran Akmal, Umar Gul, Mohammad Asif, Mohammad Aamer, Saeed Ajmal.

South Africa: Graeme Smith (captain), Jacques Kallis, Loots Bosman, Johan Botha, Mark Boucher, AB de Villiers, JP Duminy, Herschelle Gibbs, Rory Kleinveldt, Charl Langeveldt, Albie Morkel, Morne Morkel, Dale Steyn, Juan Theron, Roelof van der Merwe.

Sri Lanka: Kumar Sangakkara (captain), Muttiah Muralitharan, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Mahela Jayawardene, Dinesh Chandimal, Angelo Mathews, Thissara Perera, Nuwan Kulasekera, Suraj Randiv, Ajantha Mendis, Lasith Malinga, Chanaka Welagedara, Chamara Kapugedara, Sanath Jayasuriya, Chinthaka Jayasinghe.

West Indies: Chris Gayle (captain), Sulieman Benn, Dwayne Bravo, Shivnarine Chanderpaul, Narsingh Deonarine, Andre Fletcher, Wavell Hinds, Nikita Miller, Kieron Pollard, Denesh Ramdin, Ravi Rampaul, Kemar Roach, Darren Sammy, Ramnaresh Sarwan, Jerome Taylor.

Zimbabwe: Prosper Utseya (captain), Brendan Taylor, Charles Coventry, Andy Blignaut, Hamilton Masakadza, Tatenda Taibu, Greg Lamb, Elton Chigumbura, Vusi Sibanda, Ray Price, Graeme Cremer, Chamu Chibhabha, Chris Mpofu, Timycen Maruma, Craig Ervine.

GROUPS:

Group A
Pakistan
Bangladesh
Australia

Group B
Sri Lanka
New Zealand
Zimbabwe

Group C
South Africa
India
Afghanistan

Group D
West Indies
England
Ireland

Top two from each group progress to the Super Eight stage. Strong Irish squad and great to have Boyd Rankin back. We’ll be coming up against Eoin Morgan and England and that makes me sad. The big news in Irish cricketing circles is the move underway to get Hamish Marshall into the set up - not sure yet what I think about it to be honest. We’re already over in the West Indies and we’re starting a 3-day game with Jamaica tomorrow. 'Mon the Ireland.

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In fairness, we haven’t a hope (I’m setting expectations lower here even though we all think there’s a thin possibility of beating either England or the Windies). Its a fantastic achievement for Ireland to be at the T20 WC and another stepping stone for Irish cricket.

I have no idea to be honest who will win this, my knowledge of and interest in T20 is minimal. I was actually about to have a go at you Bandage over this thread, but then realised your motivation behind it, that being the interest in Irelands campaign. Its been hard work to get there, but fair play to them. I’d love to see the Afghani’s do something good as well.

Anyway, entertaining stuff ahead no doubt. If there’s one thing I’ll predict, its that Chrios Gayle will go absolutely mental in this competition scoring runs. He’s amazing to watch when he gets in. Otherwise he’s generally out for a duck.

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Yeah, my interest is driven by Ireland’s participation. Being competitive in this will again aid our efforts to ultimately get full test status. Very tough group all right, as you say, and it would another upset of epic proportions if we turned one of them over. That said, we were very close to defeating England in a 50 over game in Stormont last summer.

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Thats the thing Bandage, both England or the Windies could turn up and have an absolute minger of a day where they self implode, or else just blow us away. The main thing is that Ireland play well and don’t have a minger of their own.

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This is commencing tomorrow and we’re in action on the opening day against the hosts, West Indies, in Guyana. We’ve been over there since the start of the month playing a mixture of 3-day, 50 over and most recently Twenty20 matches. Overall, we haven’t been playing great and we lost our last warm up game yesterday to Afghanistan - they’re really becoming our bogey team. Our game’s starting at 10pm tomorrow so you can watch it in the pub when you’re pissed. Young George Dockrell may be opening the bowling with his offspin and he’s been bowling well, as has TJ. I’m not sure about Boyd Rankin’s fitness but we could do with him being sharp. Our batting has been poor and has let us down. We play England then on Tuesday.

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Mon the fooking Ireland. It’s starting to rock in Dublin 2. Absolutely delighted for Dockrell there.

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Did we win?

Signing in for the bandwagon if we did

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It only started a while ago.

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Look we’re not gonna win tonight but that was class by Docky. He’s only seventeen. Forza Ireland.

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Signing out

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Decent show with the ball last night, but unfortunately our chances of chasing down what could have been a manageable target were gone within two overs. Oh, to have Joyce and Morgan in the top 4! Dockrell certainly deserves plenty of praise here though. The track did suit the slower bowlers, but figures of 3-16 in 4 overs of a T20 international, including the wicket of a world-class batsman in Sarwan, are not to be sneezed at for anybody, let alone a 17-year-old.

Caught the end of the first game. Great finish. I think I’ve said this on here before, but T20 is growing on me as a format. For what it is, it is very entertaining. In terms of merit as a sporting contest, it will of course never compare to Test cricket. However, it is still a very skillful game and has developed a bit in the last few years. The trick is not to compare it to Test cricket but to other sports. For example, I flicked over from the Connacht rugby game last night to watch the end of that NZ-SL game. I went from watching literally 10 minutes of one scrum collapsing, to watching the last 5 overs of that and I can tell you there was no comparison in terms of entertainment. It also beats the balls out of 50 over cricket, which I once saw described as too short to be interesting and too long to be entertaining. I couldn’t agree more with that.

Anyway, come on the Afghans today!

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Morgan had a cracking knock for England a few minutes ago but West Indies are chasing superbly so far. Big target to follow but they’ve started like a train.

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West Indies need 8 from 6 balls to beat England.

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Windies take it with two balls left. 800 yeard of oppression can be avenged with a victory for Ireland in tomorrow’s winner take all clash with England.

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Forgot to watch the end of that after rain kicked in. Presume D/L decided it?

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Yeah, they only needed 62 or something like that.

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I didn’t see any of it but D/L decided it all right. To set a target of 192 and lose by 8 wickets must be a bit of a sore one - I don’t think D/L can really work fairly in such a short format, if it is even fair to begin with. Anyway, we needed the Windies to win given our run rate was bolloxed after being bowled out for 68 so it’s all to play for tomorrow. Morgan’s really developing into a superb player in both the 50 over and 20 over format. They’ll surely take a look at him for their test side in the short-medium term though playing the ICL meant he’s missed the chance to score some early season county championship runs for Middlesex.

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T20’s a bit of a joke, but Duckworth Lewis for it is hilarious. They should play through the rain in T20, its going to be over in 5 minutes anyway.

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We’re on at 6.30pm against England. Unfortunately, I will not get an opportunity to see much of it.

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Pissing rain in Guyana. May not be much of it to see. New Zealand leading Zimbabwe on D/L method if no further play is possible.