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Josh Little will remain in the Indian Premier League until the Gujarat Titans’ last game. Cricket Ireland has granted him permission to skip the T20I series against Pakistan and the tri-series in the Netherlands, which serve as their training grounds for the T20 World Cup in June.
The 15-man provisional World Cup squad that Ireland’s selectors announced on Tuesday is the same as the one that played Afghanistan in their most recent Twenty20 International series. The same team will play three Twenty20 Internationals against Pakistan, beginning on Friday in Dublin, followed by a tri-series with the Netherlands and Scotland from May 19–24.
Little departed India mid-tournament the previous year to play in Ireland’s ODI series against Bangladesh when World Cup qualification was at risk. Little took 4 for 45 in his opening IPL match on Saturday. However, he has been granted permission to remain for the entire season and, unless there is an improbable play-off charge, he will go home following the Titans’ last group game on May 16.
Paul Stirling will make his eighth appearance at the T20 World Cup after taking Andy Balbirnie’s place as Ireland’s white-ball captain last year. He is the fifth-highest run scorer in men’s T20I history and has participated in 21 of Ireland’s 25 previous men’s T20 World Cup games.
He is in charge of a team that hasn’t changed all that much from 2022, when Ireland qualified for the Super 12s by defeating Scotland and the West Indies in the opening round and then upsetting eventual winners England in the second round.
Three players who were not included in the 2024 squad eighteen months ago have been named: Ben White, a legspinner; Neil Rock, Lorcan Tucker’s backup wicketkeeper-batter; and Ross Adair, an attacking batsman and older brother of seamer Mark. Simi Singh, Fionn Hand, Conor Olphert, and Stephen Doheny are all absent.
“The squad is one that we have gradually developed and tested out over the last 18 or so months,” Heinrich Malan, Ireland’s coach, said. “The skillsets we need to cover are there, albeit we have allowed Josh [Little] to continue in the IPL until his side end their campaign, so he will likely join us ahead of the big tournament.
“We have an intensive block of T20 cricket coming up this month ahead of the T20 World Cup – we have seven games in 15 days as preparation for the tournament. We will not be treating those seven games as warm-ups, though, we’ll be aiming to win as many of those games as possible.”