Canterbury’s Theo van Woerkom earns maiden Ireland call-up

Cricket Ireland has announced a change to their T20 World Cup Europe Qualifier squad with injury to Gareth Delany opening the doors for Canterbury’s Theo van Woerkom in the team. Delany sustained the injury in Zimbabwe in the Cricket World Cup Qualifier vs Nepal.

van Woerkom joins the squad after plying his trade in Ireland’s domestic competition Rario Inter-Provincial Series with the Northern Knights. So far he's seen modest returns in the T20 format, with just 2 wickets from 3 games, but dominating at the top of the 50 over charts with 7 wickets from 3 - tied with North West’s Michael Erlank.

He started out in the Canterbury age ranks, making the U18s team in 2011 after his NZ U19 appearance vs Sri Lankan U21’s in 2010. Since, van Woerkom advanced to the province’s U23’s side. He had also featured in the Durham Academy and various club sides in the North East Premier League in England in 2013.

Since 2014, van Woerkom was a regular in the Ford Trophy and Plunket Shield for Canterbury, despite never earning a T20 cap in his 8 year stay with the club. He leaves the side behind having played 31 first-class matches and 26 List A with 65 wickets across the two formats in his time with the team.

With further outings with the NZ U19’s & NZ’s A side, making appearances for the NZ ‘XI’ in warm-up matches as recently as March, versus England and Sri Lanka, van Woerkom will be looking to make an impression on this Ireland side in the absence of right arm legspinner Delany.

Andrew White, National Men’s Selector, said:

“We are disappointed to lose Gareth with his broken wrist which he suffered in Zimbabwe. He has been an integral part of our T20 squad and we wish him well with his rehabilitation.

“In replacing Gareth for the T20 qualifiers, we have selected Theo van Woerkom, a player we have been watching closely since he agreed to sign for CIYMS during the winter. One of the key considerations was the experience he brings, having played First Class and List A cricket for Canterbury. Theo also played for New Zealand Under 19’s and their ‘A’ squad.

“While we have a number of promising young spinners who are progressing nicely through the pathway system, we do recognise that the step up from Inter-Provincial to international cricket is huge, and we want to ideally provide our young players the time to develop in the right manner and at the right pace. This, of course, includes the Ireland Wolves programme being fully restored to the level we know it needs to be at. Through the pathway programme, Wolves and working closely with the provincial coaches, we believe this investment in our young spinners will ensure they come through the system successfully.”