IRE vs ENG

That is all from the first T20 between Ireland and England where the visitors have claimed a 1-0 lead. The second one will be played on Friday (Sep 19) at the same venue. Make sure you join us for that but for now this is Sourabh Agrawal taking you leave on behalf of Bidipto Datta and the entire team. Hop tabs to enjoy cricketing action from around the world, cheers!

Phil Salt has been named as the player of the match for his 89 off 46 balls, here are his words: Enjoyed that, it is a pretty good ground to bat when you get going, was fun. That is the way we play, we like to take it on. Looks good when it works. There was not a lot of chat in the dressing room, it was a good total, from what I had seen there was a bit of hold. Now that you've said it (on missing out on a 5th T20I hundred) but more importantly we got the win. Happy to win the first game. It is a game of cat and mouse in a bilateral series. 

Jacob Bethell (England Captain): "Feels pretty special, to win the first one is always nice. Great feeling and can't wait to get going again on Friday. It was a good total (196), we don't know how this ground plays, a bit of an unknown, we would have said that is was a couple more but now we know how to defend here. The opening partnership averages 50, it is crazy. We have a lot of batters who can strike hard. The focus is first and foremost on winning and then we will say what happens. Very good (the atmosphere), I was speaking to a couple of lads that not many sports we get both the extremes, the big stadiums and the open spaces."

Paul Stirling (Ireland captain): "We will take all the positives from this game. I don't think we could have asked for much more than 196, but then, we knew that we had to get everything right in the second innings. We had to go for wickets, we tried to do that all the way through. We'll review what happened today, but hopefully, we get better as we go along in the tournament." 

Matthew Humphreys (2/44 in 4 overs): "We had to be brave as spinners no matter what, but they batted so well that most things got taken out of the game. We tried to shut one side of the ground, but they were better. I think the way the lads went out there with the bat was special, it was an above-par score. We want to get things going again for us on Friday with a better result." 

4:44 PM Local Time, 9:14 PM IST: MATCH SUMMARY

England (197/6 in 17.4 overs) beat Ireland (196/3 in 20 overs) by 4 wickets

Phil Salt 89(46) | Adil Rashid 1/36(4)
Harry Tector 61*(36) | Graham Hume 2/36(2)

England get home with as many as 14 balls to spare and claim their first T20 win against Ireland, a comfortable victory in the end for the visitors who have obtained a 1-0 lead in this 3-match series.

Ireland have learned a hard lesson here, they got a score that might have won them pretty much any of their games against their usual oppositions but this is a different level in which this England side operates on. They have battered the Irish bowlers and pretty much smoothly sailed past the total which looked like a challenging one at the halfway stage.

The plan was clear cut from England, they set the ball rolling within the powerplay and the game was pretty much sealed for England in the first 6 overs with the Salt-Buttler duo. Ireland did not have any answers as Salt-Buttler raced off to 50 in 3 overs with a 22-run over off Hume and eventually racing through to 74 in 4.4 overs before Buttler was dismissed. England scored 84/1 in the powerplay and the target of 197 was already looking diminutive with that kind of start.

Buttler went but that did not deter Salt, he was on a rampage and kept carting the bowlers around. A couple of 20s from skipper Bethell and Curran were enough to seal the deal as the majority of the work was done earlier itself. Salt looked good for a fifth T20I ton but fell towards the end for 89 and even though Ireland did pick up a couple of cheap wickets right at the end, England's win was never a question. Ireland used 7 bowlers in all and barring Young and Delany, everyone travelled at over 10 an over.

17.4 Barry McCarthy to Jamie Overton, FOUR RUNS! AND ENGLAND TAKE THE LEAD IN THE SERIES. Full toss on off-stump. Overton got in line and punched it. The ball went over mid-on from the middle of the bat and went over the rope after one bounce! 

17.3 Barry McCarthy to Jamie Overton, bouncer over off-stump and well-directed. Overton tried to pull it away on the back foot but was late on it. 

17.2 Barry McCarthy to Jamie Overton, back of a length on off-stump. Overton gets on to the back foot and defends it to the right of the bowler. No run. 

17.1 Barry McCarthy to Will Jacks, full around off-stump. Stroked away off the front foot with the open bat face towards deep cover point for a single. 

16.6 Matthew Humphreys to Tom Banton, OUT! Length ball on off-stump. Banton advances, looks to clear the in-field and goes through with the big shot. But all he does is mistime it straight to mid-on where Campher takes the catch! 

16.5 Matthew Humphreys to Tom Banton, FOUR MORE! Full toss on off-stump. Banton brings out the reverse-sweep again and connects over backward point for another boundary!