Online Reporter
RELENTLESS rain washed out Ireland’s reply and handed Zimbabwe the T20I series at Harare Sports Club last night.
The Chevrons had given the Irish a target of 143 to win after ending their innings at 142/6 in their allotted 18 overs.
Sikandar Raza top scored with 34 but there were good contributions from Tony Munyonga and Tashinga Musekiwa who scored identical scores of 26.
“Tony has been fantastic, he had a fantastic tour,” said Raza.
“Seeing (Ryan) Burly hit a few sixes, the way Tashinga and the way Brian has carried the team throughout the last six-seven months…lots of positives. Gwandu has been amazing.
“They (Ngarava and Muzarabani) have set the bar so high, but he is following in that path. We put ourselves in decent positions but let the games slip as well. Have put a lot of hard work over the last few months.
“We will take a 1-0 win, and even today, I felt we had a good total (on the board). This is the last day of the summer for us. The boys have a lot of away tours – the next time we meet will be in July.
“We need to keep working hard, ensure our ceiling goes higher and higher, and keep pushing ourselves to be better and better, because the end goal is to qualify for the next T20 World Cup.
“We have got our fitness program already and we have games against Canada A, Scotland A and Durham coming up.”
Paul Stirling, the Ireland captain, said:
“I think it would have been a really good game. They just crept to an above-par score, would have been a really good chase but unfortunately, the weather got in the way.
“Getting the Test win was exceptional, maybe did not capitalise on our moments in the ODIs. Lots (of positives) to take from the T20Is, don’t think we will take just the result on the whole.” − Sports Reporter/Cricinfo
