Scorecard<\/a><\/p>\nIreland caused a massive shock as they claimed a first senior international win over world champions India in Friday’s opening T20 international in Belfast.<\/p>\n
With key bowlers missing through injury, debutants Jai Moondra and Matthew Hollard starred as the hosts claimed a 34-run victory to snap their winless streak against India in the shorter format at the ninth time of asking and 12 in all formats. <\/p>\n
More than 4,000 spectators flocked to Stormont hoping to see India hand a record-breaking debut to batting sensation Vaibhav Sooryavanshi. <\/p>\n
However, after India decided to hold the 15-year-old in reserve and opted to bowl first, new Ireland captain Lorcan Tucker led Ireland’s batting charge, with his half-century helping the hosts post 182-9. <\/p>\n
The tourists made a quick start in response as Abhishek Sharma hit 50 off 20 balls, but Ireland refused to panic with Hollard (3-28) and India-born Moondra (2-26) playing a key role in a historic win at sun-splashed Stormont as India were dismissed for 148 with seven balls left.<\/p>\n
“I never expected this, to have a debut against India it’s a dream come true and I couldn’t ask for anything better,” Hollard told TNT Sports. <\/p>\n
“My family have come out from Johannesburg to support me.<\/p>\n
“I’ve been wanting to come over to Ireland since 2019 but then Covid happened and there were a lot of setbacks. My brother came first and said I had to come so I did and Cricket Ireland have been unbelievable with me.”<\/p>\n
The sides face each other again at Stormont on Sunday (13:30 BST). <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"First T20 international, Stormont Ireland 182-9 (20 overs): Tucker 50 (36), Delany 49 (32); Rana 3-24 India: 148…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":659809,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[1721,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-659808","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-cricket","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/659808","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=659808"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/659808\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/659809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=659808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=659808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=659808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}