Preview

Ireland vs Afghanistan: Ireland finally have a win this season. They came close to beating India, South Africa and New Zealand on a few occasions, and finally get their win against Afghanistan. It was a pretty good game with both teams fighting well, while Ireland managed to counter Afghanistan’s spin threat. The Ireland batting line-up is looking pretty good as their top-order are consistently getting starts and there are batters who are regularly getting big scores.

Afghanistan’s batting is an issue for them in general. While they have some decent batters, consistency due to the lack of experience is a concern. In the first game though it was more a bowling issue rather than a batting one. The spinners couldnt find their bite, while Nabi failed to contribute with both bat and ball signficantly.

Ireland vs Afghanistan Head to Head

Played-19 | Afghanistan-14 | Ireland-4 | Tie-1

Match Details

Match: Ireland vs Afghanistan

Date: 11th August 2022

Time: 8:00 PM IST

Venue: Belfast

Weather Report

The weather in Belfast is clear with some clouds around but no chance of rain during the Ireland vs Afghanistan game.

Pitch Report

The Belfast track is expected to be flat. With small boundaries runs should be easy and batting second is a better option.

Ireland vs Afghanistan Predicted Playing XI

Ireland Playing XI

Andy Balbairne(c), Stephen Doheny, Harry Tector, Curtis Campher, Paul Stirling, Goerge Dockrell, Simi Singh, Lorcan Tucker(wk), Craig Young, Josh Little, Mark Adnair

Afghanistan Playing XI

Ibrahim Zadran, Hashmatullah Shahidi, Usman Ghani, Mohammad Nabi, Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wk), Hazratullah Zazai, Najibullah Zadran, Rashid Khan, Fazal Haq Farooqi, Naveen ul Haq, Noor Ahmed

Key Players

Mohammad Nabi

Five runs with the bat and a wicket with the ball is not the contribution Nabi will want from himself. He is a really good all-rounder and can choke oppositions on his day, but looked very off-color in the first T20I. With Rashid Khan having little support, his spin is very important and he will have to get his rhythm right if Afghanistan are to level this series.

Barry McCarthy

Barry McCarthy is going relatively unnoticed in a side which is getting a lot of credit for its batting. McCarthy did well in the first game with three wickets, and is a capable wicket-taker. In all his games so far he may have been a touch expensive, but he is showing that he has it in him to be a wicket-taker, and could fall into that role soon.

See Also: Sundar takes 5 wickets haul on County Debut – Cricket Winner

Ireland vs Afghanistan Match Tips

Both teams are very unpredictable and predicting a winner is rather tough in an interesting encounter. Going by recent form and player strength though, Ireland find themselves surprisingly ahead and will want to prove that they are ahead.

Match Prediction: Ireland Will Win the Match