After a quiet few games, India's leading paceman in the T20 internationals Arshdeep Singh had a good game and probably had a match-defining impact in the second T20I against Ireland as he picked the big wicket of Andrew Balbirnie, who was going great guns at 72 in a chase of 186 runs. Arshdeep's wicket ended Ireland's hopes, whatever there were as India won the second T20I by 33 runs and hence sealed the three-match series 2-0 after having won the series opener by 2 runs (DLS method).
With this wicket, Arshdeep completed 50 wickets in T20Is in just his 33rd game for India in the format. Arshdeep became only the eighth Indian bowler to achieve the milestone of 50 T20I wickets and second fastest just after Kuldeep Yadav, both in terms of innings and number of balls as he went past Yuzvendra Chahal on both accounts in the list.
Least innings taken by Indian bowlers to pick 50 T20I Wickets
29 - Kuldeep
33 - Arshdeep*
34 - Chahal
41 - Bumrah
42 - Ashwin
50 - Bhuvi
57 - Hardik
60 - Jadeja
Balls taken to pick 50 T20I wickets (Indian bowlers)
638 - Kuldeep Yadav
663 - Arshdeep Singh*
800 - Yuzvendra Chahal
894 - Jasprit Bumrah
947 - Ravi Ashwin
979 - Hardik Pandya
1065 - Bhuvneshwar
1192 - Ravindra Jadeja
Apart from Arshdeep, Prasidh Krishna, Ravi Bishnoi and captain Jasprit Bumrah all took two wickets each as Ireland could muster only 152 runs. Earlier the likes of Ruturaj Gaikwad, Sanju Samson, Rinku Singh and Shivam Dube at the end helped India post a huge total after losing the toss. While Gaikwad took some time to get going, Samson and Rinku's innings of 40 (26) and 38 (21) proved to be the real difference at the end as both took on their chances and succeeded.
