Cricket: Lorcan Tucker saves Ireland's blushes as series with USA shared

Lorcan Tucker hit a match-winning 84. Picture: USA Cricket

A fluent 84 from Lorcan Tucker and an inspired 4-25 from Curtis Campher have led Ireland to victory in the second T20I of the Dafabet USA v Ireland Men’s International Series.

Tucker posted his second half-century of the series in an innings of eye-catching quality – he struck nine fours and three sixes in a 56-ball stay that held together the Irish innings and helped post a target which USA fell nine runs short of. This was Tucker’s highest international score, passing his 83 against Afghanistan in an ODI in January.

Campher, meanwhile, bowled an aggressive spell, effecting a run out from his own bowling to claim the first wicket before capturing four wickets – three of the wickets coming from his last over, 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 positive tone for the Irish batting unit, with Stirling striking the first ball to the boundary. However, just five balls later Ireland’s talisman was adjudged LBW, out for 5.

Ireland lost regular wickets but it was Tucker's innings which propelled them to a score of 150, which was too much for the Americans to chase down.

“It was great to get an opportunity to bat that high in the order – I haven’t batted at three 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," Tucker, who was named Player of the Match and Player of the Series, said.

“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.”

Team captain Andrew Balbirnie was satisfied with the effort - but noted improvements are needed with a T20 World Cup qualifier early in the new year.

“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," he said.

“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.”