Pakistan starts their cricket warmup for the big World Cup today (Friday) in Dublin, Ireland.
This is the first time Ireland will host Pakistan for a Twenty20 match series. They’ve only played each other once before, in the 2009 World Cup, where Pakistan won.
This three-game series against Ireland is just the beginning. After this, Pakistan heads to England for another four matches. Both these series will help them get ready for the World Cup which starts in June.
Pakistan and Ireland will face each other again in the World Cup, along with India, USA, and Canada. Only the top two teams from their group move on.
Pakistan’s coach, Azhar Mahmood, says they’ve been planning for the World Cup for a while and these matches will help finalize their strategies. He also mentioned they don’t know much about the Irish team since they haven’t played them recently, so these games will be a good learning experience.
One of Pakistan’s fast bowlers, Mohammad Amir, won’t be playing in the first match due to visa issues, but he’s expected to join the team later.
Here are the players on each team for this series:
Pakistan: Babar Azam (captain), Abrar Ahmed, Azam Khan, Fakhar Zaman, Haris Rauf, Hasan Ali, Iftikhar Ahmed, Imad Wasim, Mohammad Abbas Afridi, Mohammad Amir (unavailable for first T20I), Mohammad Rizwan, Muhammad Irfan Khan, Naseem Shah, Saim Ayub, Salman Ali Agha, Shadab Khan, Shaheen Shah Afridi and Usman Khan.
Ireland: Paul Stirling (captain), Mark Adair, Ross Adair, Andrew Balbirnie, Curtis Campher, Gareth Delany, George Dockrell, Graham Hume, Barry McCarthy, Neil Rock, Harry Tector, Lorcan Tucker, Ben White, Craig Young