Peter Connell (born 13 August 1981) is a New Zealand-born Irish

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

er. An opening bowler, he made his debut for Ireland in 2008, aged 26. He took part in Ireland's successful campaign in the 2007–08 ICC Intercontinental Cup. Connell has also represented Ireland in

One Day International A One Day International (ODI) is a form of limited overs cricket, played between two teams with international status, in which each team faces a fixed number of overs, currently 50, with the game lasting up to 9 hours. The Cricket World C ...

s (ODIs) and

Twenty20 International A Twenty20 International (T20I) is a form of cricket, played between two of the international members of the International Cricket Council (ICC), in which each team faces a maximum of twenty overs. The matches have top-class status and are the ...

s (T20Is). In January 2012 he was given a contract with Cricket Ireland.

Career

Breakthrough

Peter Connell made his

Twenty20 Twenty20 (T20) is a shortened game format of cricket. At the professional level, it was introduced by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) in 2003 for the inter-county competition. In a Twenty20 game, the two teams have a single innin ...

debut on 27 June 2008 in a match for Ireland against Bangladesh A. His three overs conceded twenty runs for no wickets and he opened the bowling with

Thinus Fourie Marthinus Jacobus Fourie (born 23 July 1979) is a former Irish cricketer. He is a right-handed batsman and a right-arm medium-pace bowler. He has played in the Ireland A cricket team since 2004, when he played for the first time against Maryle ...

. Connell made his first-class debut for Ireland on 9 July 2008 in a match against the

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as part of the 2007–08 ICC Intercontinental Cup. Opening the bowling with Thinus Fourie, Connell took a ten-wicket haul, finishing with figures of 10 wickets for 69 runs (10/69) in the match, and also took a

hat-trick A hat-trick or hat trick is the achievement of a generally positive feat three times in a match, or another achievement based on the number three. Origin The term first appeared in 1858 in cricket, to describe H. H. Stephenson taking three wic ...

as Ireland won by an innings and 67 runs. He was the 16th player in the history of first-class cricket to take a hat-trick on debut and the first to do so in an international match. He is also the only player to have taken a first-class hat-trick for Ireland. With 30 first-class wickets for Ireland, Connell is the 16th highest wicket-taker for Ireland. In the 2007–08 ICC Intercontinental Cup, Connell was Ireland's leading wicket-taker for the tournament. His haul of 28 wickets from 5 matches, at an average of 11.67, was also the fourth highest total of wickets for that year's tournament and was the best average for bowlers with 10 wickets or more. Ireland played in the ICC World Twenty20 Qualifiers in August 2008. On 2 August, the team played their maiden T20 International, beating

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

by four wickets; Connell made his T20I debut in the match, along with the rest of the Ireland team. Ireland progressed to the final and ended up sharing the trophy with the Netherlands as the match was rained off. Connell finished the tournament with 6 wickets from 4 matches, at an average of 6.00; he was Ireland's second leading wicket-taker – behind Andre Botha with 8, and tied with

Alex Cusack Alex Richard Cusack (born 29 October 1980) is a former Australian-born-Irish cricketer. A club cricketer for Clontarf, Cusack was a carpenter by trade until he was awarded a professional contract with the Irish Cricket Union in 2009. He played a ...

who also had 6 – and was the equal fifth leading wicket-taker in the tournament.

2009

Ireland took part in the 2009 Friends Provident Trophy, losing five of their eight matches and two were rained off. In Ireland's only victory of the competition, Connell took career best figures of 5/19; it was his first

five-wicket haul In cricket, a five-wicket haul (also known as a "five–for" or "fifer") occurs when a bowler takes five or more wickets in a single innings. This is regarded by critics as a notable achievement, equivalent to a century from a batsman. Takin ...

in one-day matches, beating his previous best bowling figures of 4/71. Ireland bowled

Worcestershire Worcestershire ( , ; written abbreviation: Worcs) is a county in the West Midlands of England. The area that is now Worcestershire was absorbed into the unified Kingdom of England in 927, at which time it was constituted as a county (see His ...

out for 58, their lowest ever one-day total, to win by 94 runs. Playing at

New Road, Worcester New Road is a cricket ground in the English city of Worcester. It has been the home ground of Worcestershire County Cricket Club since 1896. Since October 2017 the ground has been known for sponsorship purposes as Blackfinch New Road following ...

, Ireland received a standing ovation as they walked off the pitch. Connell finished the competition with 10 wickets at an average of 21.30. In the

2009 ICC World Twenty20 The 2009 ICC World Twenty20 was an international Twenty20 cricket tournament organised by the International Cricket Council (ICC) that took place in England in June 2009. It was the second ICC World Twenty20 tournament, following the inaugural ...

in June 2009, Ireland progressed to the super eights. Despite helping Ireland qualify for the tournament the previous year, Connell played just one match in the tournament; opening the bowling, he bowled just one over for fourteen runs in a match Ireland lost to

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

. Ireland's campaign in the 2009–10 ICC Intercontinental Cup, in pursuit of their fourth consecutive title in the competition, began in July 2009. Connell played in their first match, which was against

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; opening the bowling, he returned match figures of 2/97.

Phil Simmons Philip Verant Simmons (born 18 April 1963) is a Trinidadian cricket coach and former cricketer who was an all-rounder played as an opening batsman, a medium-fast bowler and a slip fielder. He is the current coach of the West Indies cricket ...

, Ireland's coach, was dissatisfied with Connell's performance and he was dropped for Ireland's next Intercontinental Cup match, which was against

. Simmons cited "a drop in attitude" for Connell's lack of success and subsequent drop, adding "I need to see that he's back to where he was at towards the beginning of last year. I want people to realise just how nice it is to be involved with this squad and not take it for granted." Connell was given an opportunity to prove himself in an Ireland A match against

Marylebone Cricket Club Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) is a cricket club founded in 1787 and based since 1814 at Lord's Cricket Ground, which it owns, in St John's Wood, London. The club was formerly the governing body of cricket retaining considerable global influence ...

. In January 2012 Cricket Ireland increased the number of player contracts to 23 across three categories, and Connell was given a category C contract.

References

External links

CricketArchive stats

{{DEFAULTSORT:Connell, Peter 1981 births Living people Cricketers at the 2011 Cricket World Cup Cricketers from Dannevirke Ireland One Day International cricketers Ireland Twenty20 International cricketers Irish cricketers