The high of seeing Ed confirm his place in the World Cup squad was added to by the brilliant batting of two young Irish players, William Porterfield and Kevin O'Brien, in hoisting a huge target against Kenya in the ICC World League. The excitement of watching ball-by-ball coverage on the internet cannot be underestimated, and the CricketEurope website run by Irishmen John Elder and Barry Chambers has been providing superb coverage. The format grew ever more frustrating however as the Kenyan tenth wicket partnership took the game away from Ireland. . . 6. . . 6. . .

4. . . 4. . . The failure by our seam bowlers to defend two huge scores, losing out in the crunch moments is a big worry for Adrian Birrell. "It's going to be very difficult to get up for the rest of the matches, knowing that we are out of the tournament, " he admitted yesterday.

That said, there has been much to be positive about the batsmen, especially Porterfield, who has made successive hundreds, and the spin twins of McCallan and White. There is still much to prove against Canada today and Holland on Tuesday.

"It's very difficult, " added Ireland's team manager Roy Torrens. "We prepared so well for this tournament. We trained so hard. These teams here are so evenly matched that when it comes down to the last over, it's the rub of the green and I think, in fairness, we haven't had the rub of the green in the two close matches."

The rub of the green was certainly absent against Scotland when Colin Wright survived a run-out appeal. As the CricketEurope photo gallery shows, he was at least a yard out of his ground.

The ICC last week announced the regional winners of its Development Program Awards for 2006, and there were two well-deserved Irish winners.

Richard Johnson won the Volunteer of the Year Award for helping to stage Ireland's first official ODI against England and the U-19 European Championships in 2006.

The Lifetime Service award went to Clarissa Pilkington.

Since last September this remarkable woman has collected tributes for her 60 years at the forefront of the game from Dublin University CC and from the Leinster Cricket Union. She began playing at home in Co Antrim in the 1930s and founded the Trinity women's club in 1946. She played for Ireland for many years and was again to the fore at the renaissance of women's cricket in the 1970s. She was Trinity women's coach for more than 30 seasons and regularly turned out when the team was short. The fact she was often four times the age of her team-mates was not shown in her skill and commitment. It is wonderful that the ICC have paid tribute to her in this way. Clarissa and Richard will receive an ICC plaque and be put forward for the ICC Global Awards, where the winners receive $2,000 worth of equipment.

Several readers got in touch to enquire where they could purchase the recent histories of cricket in Kilkenny and Tipperary. Michael O'Dwyer's book can be bought in all Kilkenny bookshops and in Greenes of Clare St, Dublin. It can also be had from the author at 'Garvaghey', College Gardens, Kilkenny, priced Euro35 plus post & packing. Pat Bracken's Tipperary opus is yours for Euro20 from Clongour Road, Thurles.

Signs that there's a new wind blowing for Irish cricket (No.4): Never before had three Irish cricketers scored international centuries on the same day. . .

in February. Well actually, on any day at all! An unremarked-upon footnote to Joyce's innings (left) was that he opened the batting with Malachy Loye, who himself could have played for Ireland thanks to his Irish parents. Loye turned down the opportunity as he wasn't interested in completing the 90-day residency period, and the development work required under ICC regulations. BBC stats guru Bill Frindall pointed out last week that he was the first man called Malachy to ever play international cricket.

Signs that there's a still a long way to go (No.4): TV cricket's showpony, Mark Nicholas, expounded at great length in the Daily Telegraph on Friday about why he would bring Mark Ramprakash to the World Cup. In a full page article he selected his England squad and those he would leave out. However he didn't mention the man who, by the time most readers had opened their newspaper, had scored England's first ODI century for 16 games.

It was also the first ton scored by anyone besides Marcus Trescothick for 37 games.

Days to the World Cup: 39. Peter O'Reilly, formerly of this parish, took 39 wickets for Ireland in 13 appearances, at the excellent average of 21.69.