The Rohit Sharma-led India national cricket team opened its ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2024 campaign with the battle against the Paul Stirling-led Ireland national cricket team. The match between the Group A teams was held at the Nassau County International Cricket Stadium in New York on Wednesday, June 5.
The Indian national cricket team comprehensively defeated the Irish team by 8 wickets with 46 balls remaining as they chased down the small target of 97 runs, taking advantage of Rohit Sharma’s half-century and Rishabh Pant’s good innings of 36 runs. In the match, India suffered a major blow when Rohit retired injured. He was hit on the upper arm by Josh Little’s delivery in the ninth over and decided to leave the field after some time.
Speaking after registering a win, Rohit Sharma gave a big update on his injury. He said there was nothing important but that his arm hurt. He said:
“Yeah, just a little sore (in the arm). I said it at the draw too. I’m not sure what to expect from the course. I don’t know what it’s like to play on a course that’s five months old.”
Talking more about the field, Rohit Sharma said that he did not calm down even in the second innings. He stated:
“I don’t think the wicket stabilized even when we batted second. There was enough for the bowlers. That’s pretty much what you have to do. Try to hit those lengths consistently. All these guys have played a lot of Test cricket “Arshdeep is the only one who hasn’t done it. His two wickets in front set the tone for us.”
Rohit Sharma added that the field was not the place where they could deploy their spin bowling strategy. He said:
“I don’t think we can play with four spinners here (laughs). When we chose the team, we wanted to have balance. If the conditions are right for the seamers, we wanted to have that. Spin will play a role later. Today was a four-seamer and we still managed to get two spinners who are all-rounders, to be honest, I don’t know what to expect from the pitch.”
Rohit Sharma closed by talking about the clash between India and Pakistan. He said that they will prepare for the successful game according to the conditions. Rohit Sharma said:
“We will prepare as if the conditions are going to be like this (for the game against Pakistan). This will be a type of game where all the XI will have to contribute. It was complicated, but it was good to spend some time in the middle and understand what kind of shots to play there.”
What happened in the previous T20 World Cup match between India and Ireland
The only previous meeting between India and Ireland in T20 World Cups came in the year 2009. It was the 12th match of the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup 2009 being played at the Trent Bridge in Nottingham. The only surviving member from that game to appear in the 2024 IND vs IRE clash is Rohit Sharma.
Talking about the 18-man game, India won the toss and elected to bowl first. The decision turned out to be great for the team when Zaheer Khan reviewed the batting order. Apart from Zaheer Khan’s 4-wicket haul, Pragyan Ojha got two wickets and Harbhajan Singh got one as India restricted the opposition to 112/8.
India were perfect in chasing the moderate total as Rohit Sharma (52) and Gautam Gambhir (37) got the team off to a flying start. MS Dhoni (14) and Yuvraj Singh (3) also contributed as India won the match by 8 wickets with 15 balls remaining and handed Ireland their first defeat in Twenty20 internationals.