Ireland vs Scotland Prediction: Scotland has been playing inspiring cricket

The T20 World Cup has proven that the top-ranked teams can be facing a lot of trouble from the Associates since the T20 World Cup has been going on. We have seen the giants Sri Lanka and West Indies both being taken down in rather blown-out fashions and thus the Race to Super 12s remains at an electric rate. However, the picture is still not clear-cut and a lot of combinations will decide the fate. In this game, Scotland will take on Ireland in the First Round battle. 

Scotland comes into the game after defeating West Indies by 42 runs. Batting first, they put on an impressive 160 runs as George Munsey compiled 66 runs in 53 balls, hitting 9 fours. He formed a 55 runs partnership with Michael Jones and Calum MacLeod’s 23 runs in 14 balls alongside Chris Greaves 16 runs off 11 balls gave Scottish men a strong total to defend in big ways.

Bowling-wise Scotland has been even more impressive. Mark Watt whose incredible tight lines earned him a lot of reputation during the last World Cup continued his great run after claiming three wickets for 12 runs in four overs. He received incredible support from Michael Leask who claimed two wickets for 15 runs in his four overs. Brad Wheal, Josh Davey, and Shayan Sharif shared four wickets among each other.

Ireland didn’t start the campaign on an inspiring note. Zimbabwe racked up 173 as Sikandar Raza made 82 runs in 48 balls and it came after a terrific start. Their main striker was Josh Little, who continued his impressive after picking three wickets for 24 runs in four overs. Mark Adair and Simi Singh both shared two wickets each. Four bowlers conceded 9+ Runs Per Over and that stalled the hard work of Little.

Batting wise, the Irish unit never got going at all. They lost four wickets for just 22 runs as they were rocked by the pace attack of Zimbabwe. Their first four players couldn’t even go past 11 points mark, with Stirling, Balbirnie, and Tector scoring in single digits. George Dockrell, Gareth Delaney, and Curtis Campher scored in 20s but they weren’t the type of innings that can gun down a target that became in the excess of 10 an over later.

• Bowlers: Mark Watt, Michael Leask, Josh Little, Mark Adair;
• Batters: Paul Stirling, Lorcan Tucker, Harry Tector, George Munsey, Richie Berrington, Calum McLeod

The Scottish men will enter with a ton of momentum and the sky is the limit for this squad. They have found sparkplugs in multiple games throughout the World Cups since the last edition and there is no doubt that the next leap is here if the development draws sufficient interest from ICC which has been criticized for its role in developing Associate talents. As for this game, I see the Scottish man capitalizing on the momentum but we can’t underestimate Ireland. Teams that have batted first have enjoyed a lot of success and there have been two scores of 160 and more here. I believe this will indeed be a high-scorer and Scotland will pull through again.