ICC Intercontinental Cup will benefit Zimbabwe cricket, says Taibu

"It will create more pressure for places in the national team," says former Test captain"We will be one of the top teams in this competition," says Afghanistan coachIreland on the brink of victory over Scotland in Aberdeen while Uganda completes seven-wicket win in Bermuda

Former Test captain Tatenda Taibu says the ICC Intercontinental Cup will be a positive influence on the development of the game in Zimbabwe after he led a strong team to a draw with an Afghanistan team that keeps on making waves.

Taibu, who scored a century in each innings of the match, is determined to make it back into the national side after a period on the sidelines.

"The competition is definitely good for our players as they get to play against different teams in different conditions," said Taibu. "It is good for the up-and-coming players and it will put pressure on the players in the national team and create some competition for places," he said.

"I am always saying to myself, whether I am playing club cricket, first-class cricket or cricket for my country, that I should try and enjoy it, so it was a good thing for me to get away from the real pressure where everybody is looking at you? It was a good track for batting. They were one man down, as one of their bowlers got injured very early on in the game and we took advantage of that."

Although it ended in a draw, Nowroz Mangal's team will take nine points compared to Zimbabwe XI's three from the match because it was ahead after the first innings and, were it not for the contribution of Tatenda Taibu, the Africans would have been in serious trouble.

The wicketkeeper-batsman was impressed with the performance of Afghanistan, a team he had not played against previously.

"They were a lot better than we all expected. They batted very well in defence, but they could probably work on putting away the bad ball, as they missed out on some of the bad balls that we bowled.

"I hope to be back in the national team by the time we play Bangladesh and try and help get revenge for the defeats at home."

Afghanistan coach Kabir Khan hit back at critics of his team who said it was fortunate to be playing in this competition and was not ready for the challenge.

"Some people thought we may have been lucky to finish in the top 10 at the ICC Cricket World Cup Qualifier and that it was a fluke, but I think that we are going to be one of the top teams in this tournament," said Kabir.

"People said that they thought we could only play one-day cricket and that we would be trying to hit every ball, but we have proved them wrong as well. We have answered a lot of critics and showed that we rightly qualified for this," he said.

"We are really pleased at how we did in our opening first-class game. I never expected that. Our warm-up matches in Kabul helped us a lot and we played very professionally here. It looked like we had been playing the game for a long time."

Kabir reserved some particular praise for his opening batsman Noor Ali, who was the other player in the match ? along with Taibu ? to score a century in each innings.

"It was a great effort from Noor Ali and he was very professional in the way he batted. I hope the way he is playing he will score a lot of runs at this level."

Meanwhile, ICC Intercontinental Cup defending champion Ireland is on the verge of victory after it dominated day three against Scotland in Aberdeen.

Captain William Porterfield scored 118 to go with his 77 in the first innings as Ireland set the home team a formidable target of 298 to win with four sessions to do it. But Scotland did not begin that run-chase well, losing opener Fraser Watts with just one run on the board and four more wickets before the close, including the centurion from the first innings, Qasim Sheikh.

At the close, Scotland was in real trouble on 72-5, still requiring 226 runs for victory. With rain forecast for the Aberdeen area, the Scots will be hoping for some assistance from the weather as they seek to save this game.

Uganda beat Bermuda inside three days in Hamilton when it reached its fourth-innings target of 111 for the loss of just three wickets. Despite losing opener Roger Mukasa with just two runs on the board, Lawrence Sematimba (39), Benjamin Musoke (25 not out) and Davis Arinaitwe (30 not out) made sure the job was done.