Veteran Irish Cricketer Paul Stirling has finally gone past former Indian Captain Rohit Sharma’s all time record of the most capped player in Men’s T20I cricket.
That historic milestone was achieved by Stirling in Thursdays first T20I against the United Arab Emirates at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium in Dubai.
Stirling – who now finds himself ranked number 1 in the world – has now played 160 T20I’s for Ireland. At the age of 35 hes scored a respectable 3,874 runs at an average of 26.53. Heve managed to not out score his way to 24 half centuries and one ton with a top score of 115 thats unbeaten.
Sharma now sits in second place has still managed to smash 4,231 runs in 159 matches for India. This has been done at an average of 32.05 thanks to a total of five Centuries and 32 half-centuries. He was also the most capped player in Men’s T20 I’s for his country until Stirling surpassed him
Now Stirling , Sharma, and then Ireland’s George Dockrell (153 games), Afghanistan’s Mohammad Nabi (148) , England’s Jos Buttler (141), Pakistan’s Babar Azam (137), New Zealand’s Ish Sodhi (136), England’s Adil Rashid (134), and South Africa’s David Miller (133) make up a pretty elite group.
Moving on to the UAE vs Ireland first T20i – the visitors managed to post a decent 178 runs for six wickets in their 20 overs. But unfortunately for Stirling its been a bit of a tough game for him, managing to only score 8 runs of three deliveries.
On the other hand, the Irish batting line up showed some real promise – thanks in no small part to the efforts of – Ross Adair (39 off just 29) , wicket keeper-batter (38 off 25), Curtis Campher (25 off 23) , Benjamin Calitz (26 not out from just 12 balls), and George Dockrell (22* from 10) who all chipped in with some valuable runs.
For the UAE, Junaid Siddique (2/36) and Haider Ali (2/31) each managed a pair of wickets
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