Ireland have come up with some superb displays in the ongoing World Cup and continue to press their case for a Test status. How well Ireland have done in this tournament can be gauged by the fact that their captain William Porterfield has started to detest the term ‘associate country’.
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“That’s a tag I don’t like,” said Porterfield. “I don’t think teams should be associated any differently, and putting those tags on us.
“As far as I’m concerned, there is a ranking system in place and that’s where we’re at.”
Porterfield said people back home have started taking note of their efforts in the tournament, and he was hopeful that the world governing body would do the same.
“As far as the publicity and the hype back home…you speak to people who are there and the stories that you see coming out are great,” he added.
“So, hopefully, we do make the quarter-finals and keep pushing on as a country, and hopefully we will start looking at the next World Cup.
“Obviously, I have said before that cutting teams in the World Cup isn’t the way forward unless that’s the vision for the game. But if you want to make progress and grow the game of cricket, then cutting teams in world competitions isn’t the way forward.”
If Ireland go on to lose today’s match against India, they will still have the final group game against Pakistan in Adelaide on March 15, the winner of which will progress to the quarter-final.
The loser will have to get into a net run rate situation with the West Indies, if the Caribbean side manage to beat the UAE on Thursday.
“Every game is our toughest game,” added the captain. “Our next game is always a challenge, because it is the next chance we’ve got to grab two points.
“Yeah, it’s a nice position to be in. We want to be in the quarter-finals, which is a goal we set ourselves before we came here. But it doesn’t count for anything if we don’t keep getting good performances.”
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