2nd T20I, Belfast, July 20, 2022, New Zealand tour of Ireland (Josh Little 0*, Michael Bracewell 3/5) – RESULT, NZ vs IRE, 2nd T20I, live score, 2022

6.52 pm A sorry effort from Ireland. The visitors nearly double them up in the end. It means that New Zealand has taken the series with a match to spare. Cleaver sets up the win with a half-century, Sodhi wipes out the middle order before Bracewell’s extraordinary tour of Ireland continues now with a hat-trick after his heroics in the ODIs.

Player of the Match is Dane Cleaver: “Pretty special day and obviously contributing to a good win for the country, pretty happy. The wicket offered a little bit of variation so it probably wasn’t my most fluent innings but you try to stick to your options so it paid off. Very special to have my family here. It’s a beautiful island and they’re enjoying it. Wanted nothing more than playing for my country with my entire life so it’s great to contribute to a win.”

Ireland captain Andy Balbirnie: “Sometimes you can have days like that with the bat. When you’re 50-odd for 7 chasing 170, you’re never really in the game. [The pitch] played similar throughout the whole game so we as batters have to take responsibility that this isn’t good enough in international cricket. We’ve got one more crack at them and we’ll see how we go.”

New Zealand captain Mitchell Santner: “The wicket looked a little better in the first innings but it was a bit up and down. The way Dane paced that innings was good and then our bowlers did well. There’s not a lot that [Bracewell] can’t do at the moment so I thought I’d get him in there. We’re pretty happy with the win today.”

That’s it for today’s coverage. Come back on Friday for the final match in this T20I series. On behalf of Sreshth Shah, I’m Peter Della Penna. Take care!