SA hope Birrell is lousy prophet

02 March 2015 - 02:04 By Telford Vice in Brisbane
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Proteas assistant coach Adrian Birrell.
Proteas assistant coach Adrian Birrell.
Image: CLIVE MASON

South Africa's assistant coach Adrian Birrell will hope he is not a prophet. If he is, what he said yesterday about his team's opponents in their World Cup match in Canberra at 5.30am tomorrow will bite him in the backside.

"Every World Cup, they seem to beat a full member team," Birrell said. "They beat Pakistan, tied with Zimbabwe and beat Bangladesh in 2007. In 2011, they had that famous win against England. In this World Cup, they've beaten West Indies."

Ireland - the opponents Birrell was talking about - were coached by him at the 2007 World Cup, so there has been no mention of the m-word in the SA camp since the focus moved to the Irish after the rousing 257-run win over the Windies in Sydney on Friday.

Minnows? Not Ireland.

"They bat deep and they know how to chase targets," Birrell said. "Four out of the top 10 World Cup chases are Ireland chases, three of them over 300 - and two of them against full-member teams."

That was the 329/7 they made to beat England four years ago and the 307/6 they made against West Indies on February 16. The Proteas, too, know the fighting qualities of the Irish - they stumbled to 117/5 against them in Kolkata in 2011 before JP Duminy and Colin Ingram shared a stand of 87.

Duminy will miss the match due to injury but Ireland can be sure they will have to deal with AB de Villiers, who plundered an undefeated 162 off the Windies - an innings with equal parts of brilliance, belligerence and ballet.

"He is in a rich vein of form, but he is very often in a rich vein of form," Birrell said. "His stats in the last year have been phenomenal, but we're not a one-player team.

"I don't know if there's an attack in the world that can contain AB. It's a matter of getting him out and if you can't get him out he's going to hurt you."

De Villiers's genius is already a fact, so that was not a prophesy.

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