Singh’s hoping to leave Afghanistan in a spin

SIMI SINGH will again spearhead a four-man spin attack in Dehradun tomorrow, as Ireland look to level the five match one-day international series against Afghanistan in the north-eastern Indian city.

The Ireland selectors dropped seamer Barry McCarthy for an extra spinner after losing the opening match and the tactic proved more successful in stemming the runs on Saturday, with Afghanistan pegged to 250-7 from 48.3 overs before rain arrived and forced an abandonment.

Singh, who was born only 100 or so miles away in Punjab before moving to Dublin in his twenties, has spent time in India during the winter working on his bowling and has reaped the rewards with spells of 1-19 from 10 overs and 1-33 from eight in the two ODIs.

“I’ve been training a lot on my bowling every day,” Singh (right) said. “It has certainly helped bowling on these sort of pitches, as you have to bowl with the right pace depending on each surface. Practising in these conditions has definitely helped me.

“The ball is coming out beautifully at the moment. I’m happy with the accuracy and the pace I’m bowling with. There’s even some natural variations, with some balls skidding on.

“The wickets are getting more spin-friendly and I think they will incline that way as we progress in the series.”

While Ireland cannot hope to match the world-class Afghan spin trio of Rashid Khan, Mujeeb Rahman and Mohammad Nabi, Singh knows that if Ireland can restrict the hosts to a par score then they have the batting firepower to win games. “We just need to click a couple of partnerships together,” he said. “Stirlo (Paul Stirling) and Kevvy (Kevin O’Brien) are in good form, Dockers (George Dockrell) too. Others just need to find a bit of form and we’ll definitely back ourselves to come out on top at the end of the series.”