Ireland started the series with a win. Afghanistan equalized by winning the second T20I. The third and final match on Monday in Sharjah therefore turned into an undeclared final.
Ireland could not get along with the Afghans in that ‘final’. Rashid Khan’s team claimed the series trophy by beating the Irish by 57 runs with a margin of 2-1. Earlier, Afghans won the three-match ODI series against the same opponent by 2-0. A match is abandoned.
Afghanistan set a target of 156 runs in front of Ireland to win on Monday night. The Irish fell out of the match after losing 3 wickets for 15 runs and 5 wickets for 46 runs in the run chase.
In between, Kurtis Kampfer (28 from 23) and Gareth Delaney (21 from 19) tried to put up some resistance. But that didn’t help much except to reduce the margin of defeat. Ireland’s innings ended in 98 runs in 17.2 overs.
Azmatullah Omarzai picked up 4 wickets for just 9 runs, Naveen Ul Haque 3 wickets for 10 runs.
Earlier, after 17 overs, Afghanistan won the toss and came to bat with 118 runs for 5 wickets. Afghans made a challenging score of 155 runs for 7 wickets by picking up 37 runs in the last 3 overs.
Ibrahim Zadran ended up unbeaten on 72 off 51 balls. This batsman hit 5 fours and 3 sixes in Marcutt innings. This is his career best innings in T20. Besides, wicketkeeper Mohammad Isak scored 27 runs off 22 balls.
