Ireland captain Trent Johnston spoke of his pride in the team effort that saw UAE dismissed for 228 on the first day of their ICup game.

"It was good that we hit the ground running today after being without a game for over 6 months. We've seen how tough an opponent they can be with their recent performances against Kenya and Namibia, and it's a great effort to knock them over for 228 on that pitch. It was a super performance by the lads, and we stuck at it, even when they put on that partnership of 97"

"They were without two of their main players in Khurram Khan and Arshad Ali, and they are in my opinion, their best two batsmen. We didn't know a lot about their team, but our game plan was to bowl at 4th or 5th stump and build pressure, and go from there. It didn't quite work out that way, but you've got to remember we've come from indoor training at 6 degrees, to out here where it's over 30 and with 80% humidity, on flat wickets that don't bounce like North County, and to come into your first competitive game and bowl out a team that's won the toss for 230, you just can't do better than that."

How then did he see the game progressing? "I'd obviously like for us to bat most of tomorrow and a bit of Saturday as well. I've told Eoin (Morgan) and Porty (William Porterfield) to grind it out and bat as long as they like. I think we could need 100 overs to bowl them out again - that's just over a day. I don't think we'll need 600, but I certainly would like to get somewhere around the 500 mark."

"I can't see them getting 300 in the second innings particulary when we've got Kyle Mc Callan and Greg Thompson, who will probably come into the game more as the pitch starts to wear. It'll get lower and Andre Botha and Alex Cusack will come into the reckoning and of course there's Lanky (Langford-Smith) with the new pill. I've got plenty of options."

"500 is our initial target and the opening session is a big one - especially as it's a 3 hour one. Luckily we're batting, and it's good in that we won't have to bowl twice in a row as we did here 12 months ago in our previous win. Thankfully we had Boyd (Rankin) who came up with an inspired spell back then, but with him not here because of injury, then we don't have that in our armoury."

"Still we do have plenty of options, and hopefully we'll get our feet up tomorrow and watch the guys pile on the runs."