Scotland announce 15-member squad for ICC World Cup Qualifier

SCOTLAND: Cricket Scotland on Wednesday named their 15-member squad for the ICC Men’s World Cup Qualifier in Zimbabwe which is set to commence on June 18.

Scotland have retained much of the same squad that lifted the ICC Cricket World Cup League 2 title in February. Scotland have made two changes to the squad that last played in Nepal, with Alasdair Evans and Adrian Neill returning by replacing Liam Naylor and the retired Kyle Coetzer.

Evans was one of the 14 contracted men’s players for 2023-2024 announced last week and is in line to play his first ODI since 2021.

“I think there’s a good mixture in this squad of youth and senior players who’ve been around a while – the likes of Richie and George, as well as some exciting young talent in Jack Jarvis and Chris McBride,” Interim Head Coach Doug Watson said in an official statement released by Cricket Scotland.

“It’s obviously a wonderful opportunity coming up in Zimbabwe, and the guys that we’ve selected are all really excited and fizzing to go. They know how tough the challenge is going to be,” he added.

“It’s moving into winter over there just now, and the conditions are changing and will be quite spin-friendly, but the key thing will be for us to adapt to the conditions and approach the games the way we want to play them,” Watson said.

Scotland will be hoping to carry their form over from League 2 to the Qualifier where they will battle nine other teams for two spots in the Cricket World Cup later this year. The bottom five from the Super League — West Indies, Sri Lanka, Ireland, Zimbabwe and Netherlands — will join League 2 top three Scotland, Oman and Nepal as well as Play-off finalists United States and UAE to take part in the Qualifier in Zimbabwe.

Squad: Richie Berrington (captain), Matthew Cross, Alasdair Evans, Chris Greaves, Jack Jarvis, Michael Leask, Tom Mackintosh, Chris McBride, Brandon McMullen, George Munsey, Adrian Neill, Safyaan Sharif, Chris Sole, Hamza Tahir, Mark Watt.