“This morning somebody asked me where Jersey was,” says the island cricket side’s captain Charles Perchard.
After Friday’s last-ball win over Scotland, there will be few in the sport who can fail to have heard of the tiny Channel Island.
But for hosts Netherlands beating Italy by nine wickets on Friday evening, Jersey – with its population of just over 100,000 – would have been heading to India and Sri Lanka next February to take on the globe’s best in the T20 World Cup.
Despite the disappointment of missing out after finishing third behind Italy on net run rate in the ICC T20 World Cup Europe qualifying group, Jersey know they are capable of mixing it with the big boys.
“We lost a nail-biter to the Dutch – they chased our score with three balls to go,” Perchard told BBC Sport.
“Time and time again when we’ve been coming up the gears to play against these better sides, we’ve rubbed shoulders with them very well.
“We’ve caused some scares – we could have beaten Zimbabwe when they were at home, in Scotland we blew another tight run chase against them.
“That win today shows we can do it and the belief will be there for the guys so that hopefully next time we’ve got a tight run chase, we will know we’ve been there before, we’ve done it before and we can do it again.”
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