CRICKET WORLD CUP: Ireland v The Netherlands:SOME OF Ireland's players were quite literally down in the dumps yesterday as they spent part of their day off visiting one of the Goal charity projects in this teeming city of 14 million souls.
Three of the panel visited the Bhagar colony, a community that survives on rag picking at the municipal dumps in the sprawling Howrah suburbs.
And outside the Goal centre, which doubles as a school, there was only one man they wanted to meet. Here, in a community of 600 people, with one communal television, they waited with battered bats and scraps of paper to sign, while those with a mobile phone stood patiently in line to get their photographs taken with a cricketing hero.
“Where is Kevin O’Brien? We want O’Brien.”
In a country of 1.2 billion people, the Sandymount player’s wonderful World Cup-record innings against England has reached all the way to the lowest strata of society. The man with the pink and white hair was their slumdog millionaire.
“It was a real eye-opener, they were unbelievable scenes,” said O’Brien. “It is a dump, but the people are extremely happy, they obviously don’t know any different the way they have been brought up, the way they live. It is an experience which will live long in my memory and it’s great what Goal can do.”
On a day of contrasts the squad were later treated to a day at the races by the Royal Calcutta Turf Club, not quite Prestbury Park but they still made the enclosure where captain William Porterfield presented the prize of a whip to the winner of the Ireland Trophy. The announcer even took great delight in commenting on the whipping Ireland handed out to England in Bangalore.
Nobody knows more, though, that the memory of that improbable run-chase against our nearest cricketing neighbours will be undone if they fail to back up their standing as the leading Associate nation in their final Group B outing against the Netherlands at Eden Gardens tomorrow.
“We can’t qualify, but it’s still a World Cup game and we want to finish the tournament well and finish in front of Holland and take the four points,” remarked O’Brien.
The Dutch have also impressed in the tournament despite failing to secure a victory, and they possess some impressive strength in their batting line-up in Ryan ten Doeschate, Tom Cooper and Alexei Kervezee.
Summing up the mood in the squad, O’Brien said they have no intention of letting slip their fine record of having won the last five of the six One-Day Internationals against the Dutch going back over four years.
“We obviously know them very well and no one in our team will be taking them for granted. We will be preparing for the game in the same way as we have prepared for the previous five,” added O’Brien.
“We know it’s a massive game to really show the ICC we are the best Associate, and to do that means putting in a big performance like South Africa put in last night. We aim to win convincingly, bowl them out for a low total and really put our foot down and say we are number one.”
Ireland are expected to name the same starting XI from the side that went down to the Proteas by 131 runs at Eden Gardens on Tuesday night.
