Toss: Netherlands opt to bat vs Ireland
Netherlands' captain Pieter Seelaar won the toss and elected to bat against Andy Balbirnie's Ireland in the first game of the T20 World Cup in Abu Dhabi. Balbirnie said that he was "not too disappointed" to chase on a track that he felt would remain consistent throughout the game.
Legspin-bowling allrounder Gareth Delany, who was left out of Ireland's last T20 series, made his return to the Ireland XI. He's been part of the T20 Blast with Leicestershire and most recently struck a 50-ball 88 against Bangladesh in a warm-up game last week. Ben White is the other legspinner in the line-up, but there was no room for fingerspin-bowling allrounder George Dockrell.
As for Netherlands, they left out Philippe Boissevain, CPL winner Paul van Meekeren, and Tim van der Gugten from their XI. Back-to-back Super Smash winner Logan van Beek and Fred Klaassen, who has played club cricket in New Zealand and has also had a stint in the Hundred, will be part of the seam attack along with Brandon Glover.
Netherlands have the wood over Ireland in T20Is, having won seven of the 11 completed matches against them.
Ireland: 1 Paul Stirling, 2 Kevin O'Brien, 3 Andy Balbirnie (capt), 4 Gareth Delany, 5 Curtis Campher, 6 Harry Tector, 7 Neil Rock (wk), 8 Simi Singh, 9 Mark Adair, 10 Josh Little, 11 Ben White
Netherlands: 1 Ben Cooper, 2 Max O'Dowd, 3 Bas de Leede, 4 Colin Ackermann, 5 Ryan ten Doeschate, 6 Scott Edwards (wk), 7 Roelof van der Merwe, 8 Pieter Seelaar (capt), 9 Logan van Beek, 10 Fred Klaassen, 11 Brandon Glover
Deivarayan Muthu is a senior sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo
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