FANTASY
Follow UsAn action packed ODI series came to an end as Ireland managed to miraculously draw the series 1-1. Now, the action shifts to the shortest format of the game as teams look to get things right for the big event later in October. Ireland have had a decent run since 2019 in T20Is. In fact, they have been better than South Africa in terms of win percentage. Ireland have won 54 percent of their matches as compared to South Africa’s 45 percent. Though the two teams haven’t met each other in this format, it promises to be one spellbinding one.
SUGGESTED TEAM
While you could go for the above team, you also have the option of choosing your own team from Cricket.com’s Fantasy Research Centre. Based on algorithms, we have come up with one team
GROUND DETAILS
The Village, Malahide, Dublin ground isn’t a big one. Hence, there has been plenty of runs on offer in the shorter formats. In the ODI series we saw teams scoring 290 and 346 in the first innings. Even in the T20s, runs have come easily. On an average, 187 runs have been scored in the first innings at this venue T20s since 2019. In the 10 innings played at this venue in this period, teams have scored 180+ in eight of those. To add more, 64.5 percent of the runs have come through boundaries in this time frame. A tell-tale sign of a high scoring encounter.
In the bowling front, the pacers have bagged the most wickets, 57.1 percent of the wickets. But, the spinners haven’t done too bad. To be precise, they have done better than the pacers. Their percentage of wickets bagged (42.9%) may be less than the pacers, but their strike rate of 16.7 as compared to 20.2 speaks about their early success. There is no difference in economy as both have conceded over 9.
SUGGESTED CAPTAIN
On the Back of a fantastic T20I series against West Indies, it is hard to look past Quinton de Kock as the captain of the fantasy team. He had scored 255 runs at a strike rate of 141.7 with three 50+ scores, all in succession. The biggest advantage of his batting is the start he provides. He has scored at a strike rate of 148 and has smashed 70 sixes in the first six overs, the joint second most among all batsmen in T20s since 2019. This is evident enough to say, de Kock is in red-hot form and why he should be the captain.
Our Criclytics player projections predicts, de Kock could score 40-60 runs in the first T20I
X-FACTOR
De Kock for South Africa and Paul Stirling for Ireland, have done similar jobs. Both of them are dashers at the start and have provided excellent starts for their team. Stirling has scored at a strike rate of 148.5 in the Powerplay, which is the second highest among batsmen who have faced 600 balls in T20s since 2019. Also, with 1787 runs Stirling is the most successful Irish batsmen in T20s since 2019.
Our Criclytics player projection predicts, Stirling could score 20-30 runs in the first T20I
Raw pace with accuracy is a difficult art to conquer, but Kagiso Rabada has mastered it already and that is one of the reasons why he is so successful across formats. In T20s since 2019, Rabada has bagged 94 wickets at a stunning strike rate of 15. No bowler who has bagged 75+ wickets has a better strike rate than Rabada in this period. With a stunning record like this, why wouldn’t he be an x-factor
Our Criclytics player projection predicts, Rabada could pick 0-1 wicket in the first T20I
Another bowler who saw great success in the T20 series against West Indies was Tabraiz Shamsi. He bagged 7 wickets in that series and had conceded at an economy of four. The year 2021 itself has been a great one for Shamsi. He has 17 wickets at an average of 14.8 and a strike rate of 16.6. Only Obed McCoy (18) of West Indies has bagged more wickets than him in international T20 this year.
Our Criclytics player projection predicts, Shamsi could bag 1-2 wickets in the first T20I
