Wilson takes positives but admits Ireland must solve Rashid riddle

Gary Wilson had barely begun life as Ireland head coach before being confronted by one of the most familiar problems in Irish cricket.

Rashid Khan.

Different coach, a number of different players, but the Afghanistan superstar remains an enduring thorn in Ireland’s side and once again he proved the decisive figure as the Boys in Green suffered a 92-run defeat at Bready.

Yet while Wilson could hardly disguise his disappointment at the margin of defeat, his overriding emotion afterwards was not one of despondency.

For long enough, he felt Ireland had competed on even terms with Afghanistan. The problem was that they could not sustain it.

“I think at times we were a little bit rusty but there were lots of pleasing things as well,” said Wilson.

“Some of the less experienced guys did nicely. I thought Byron McDonough bowled particularly well, I thought Cade was excellent the way he played at three and Ben showed how dangerous he can be batting in that middle order as well.

“There were definitely pleasing aspects to it, but we probably just didn’t do it for long enough.

“Every time we sort of wrestled momentum back and were in the game — actually at a couple of points maybe even ahead of the game — we seemed to lose a wicket in the chase and that hurt us in the end.”

And invariably the man doing the hurting was Rashid.

Ireland have seen more than enough of the Afghan leg-spinner over the years to know precisely the threat he poses, but knowledge and execution are two very different things.

Wilson admitted there will be plenty of discussion before the sides renew acquaintances.

“He’s a fine bowler. He is a world-class bowler and today he got the better of us,” he conceded.

“It’s something we’ll have to think about over the next week and a half that we’re playing them.

“It’s not that we didn’t have plans. Guys had their plans, but he’s a world-class bowler.

“We’ll just have to reflect as a group and as individuals and see how we go about playing him a little bit better.”

If defeat provided Wilson with plenty to ponder, there was encouragement in the performances of an Ireland side containing several players at the beginning of their international careers.

Jai Moondra showed enough with the new ball to justify Wilson’s faith, even if the new Ireland coach felt the seamer occasionally searched too hard for swing.

“We like what Jai can offer up front with the swinging ball and he showed that,” said Wilson.

“He was probably a little bit fuller than he would have wanted to be, but I really liked the way we carried a threat in the first ten overs.

“We created five opportunities in that ten — a couple of run-outs, a couple of nick-offs that didn’t carry and then we got Gurbaz.

“Maybe if we have them two or three down in the first ten it’s a slightly different story.

“Jai can bowl with good pace, he can swing the ball and attack the stumps. He’ll definitely be better for the outing.”

McDonough also impressed his new head coach with his control.

“Byron was really accurate,” added Wilson. “He lives in that sort of six-to-eight metre length.

“The pitch probably wasn’t as quick as he would have liked. He would probably like it a little quicker to get guys on the back foot a bit more and we might see that at Stormont.”

There was also a glimpse of the destructive potential Ben Calitz can bring to an Ireland middle order.

Calitz was prepared to take on Rashid rather than merely survive against him, an approach which ultimately led to his downfall but which Wilson has no intention of discouraging.

“You saw the way Ben can play towards the end,” he said.

“The lesson for him is that he needs to do it for longer periods of time and that’s the catch-22 when you pick a guy like that because you don’t want to take away his X-factor.

“He got himself into a battle with Rashid. On one hand it’s great to see him backing himself like that.

“Rashid will definitely be the happier of the two tonight, but it’s great to see someone come in with that belief in himself.

“He would have been in no doubt that he was going to chase those runs down. He’ll go away, think about it and hopefully come up with a plan for the next game.”

There was reassurance too from one of the established figures, with Mark Adair delivering the sort of controlled opening spell that has become his trademark.

“We know what he can do,” said Wilson. “He’s accurate up front, moves the ball laterally, swings it and hits a length.

“He had a couple of nick-offs that didn’t quite carry and on another day he gets those as well. We were really happy with the way he performed.”

Andrew Balbirnie’s innings was another source of encouragement, Wilson describing the former captain as looking “brilliant” during his stay at the crease.

That, perhaps, was Wilson’s biggest takeaway from his first defeat in the job.

There were enough glimpses to suggest Ireland can trouble Afghanistan. Now comes the considerably harder task of turning promising passages of play into complete performances.

“There are loads of positives in there,” he insisted.

“With a slightly less experienced group, there are some real experienced heads in there as well.

“It’ll do those guys who maybe have a few less caps the world of good to go out there and see that they actually can compete against these guys.

“They just need to be able to do it for longer periods of time than we did today.”

For Wilson and Ireland, that is the challenge.

And somewhere near the top of the homework list before the next encounter will be finding an answer to a familiar question: just how do they stop Rashid Khan?