IRELAND'S cricketers World Cup hopes are still on the rails despite an eight-wicket mauling by India yesterday. The world champions outplayed the Irish - but not without a couple of frights along the way.

The result means Phil Simmons' men now have to beat Pakistan in a winner-takes-all game in Adelaide in the early hours of Sunday.

Having won the toss and batted for the first time in the tournament, the Irish opening batsmen attacked from the start and had built up 89 without loss when Paul Stirling played a loose shot and was caught.

“From the position we were in we could have gone a few more runs,” said William Porterfield, who made 67 as Ireland totalled 259, the highest score in five matches against India in this tournament.

MS Dhoni brought on his spinners and Ed Joyce fell soon after Stirling. But Niall O'Brien joined his captain and played a typical battling innings at first before opening his shoulders to hit three 6s and seven 4s in a run-a-ball 75.

“I had a slow start but I knew we had time in the bank because of how well William and Paul had started”, said O'Brien. “It was difficult to know which way Ravi Ashwin was turning it, he's been bowling really well all tournament.

“I was disappointed to get out as there was a 100 there for the taking but I wanted to be positive for the team.”

From a platform of 206-3 with 11 overs left Ireland might have expected to score 320 or more, but the quality of the Indian spinners and the pace of Mohammed Shami ruined that hope.

Five wickets fell in the next 22 balls and all that was left was for John Mooney to marshal a repair job in the tail which took the score to the highest Ireland have made against India.

But Ireland's bowling has been misfiring all through the World Cup and again failed to break through the top quality India batsmen. Porterfield and Mooney dropped tough chances but Shikhar Dhawan (100) and Rohit Sharma (64) took just 23 overs to rack up a stand of 174, the highest opening partnership against Ireland in World Cups.

They both fell to Stuart Thompson, who surprisingly came in for Andrew McBrine but recovered well after a disastrous first over which went for 18 runs.

Virat Kohli (43*) and A Rahane (33*) saw India home without fuss with a stand of 70 in less than nine overs, clinching their ninth win on the trot in World Cups.