Most of us will have hardly noticed as we snored our way towards the dawn, but a notable milestone in Irish sport occured just after 4am this morning.

At that time Ireland’s male cricketers commenced battle with New Zealand in their last game of a T20 World Cup that has reawakened interest in the sport here thanks to fine wins over West Indies and England.

And 30 minutes later Laura Delany — sister of Gareth, leg-spinner on the men’s team — led Ireland’s women’s side onto the field, 10,000km from Adelaide in the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore for the start of a six-match series against Pakistan. Large crowds are expected in a city that has only staged one women’s series since 2011.

The reason for that drought was the fall-out from a gun attack on the Sri Lankan team bus en route to the stadium in 2009 by the Army of Jhangvi, a Sunni supremacist group. Eight members of the visiting team were wounded, and six Pakistani policemen and two civilians were killed.

Pakistan lost the co-hosting rights to the 2011 World Cup and did not stage a home game for eight years, but most of the major nations have visited in the past three years with heightened security in place. The assassination attempt on former cricket captain turned politician Imran Khan yesterday will ensure security will be ramped up for the three ODIs and three T20s. In the last 12 months West Indies and Sri Lanka women’s sides have toured the Land of the Pure without incident.

And now it’s Ireland’s turn. Veteran wicket-keeper Mary Waldron is excited about the prospect, saying ‘I saw the fixtures come out earlier this year and I’ve never wanted to be picked for a tour more. Pakistan has played a huge part in Irish cricket, our first ever Women’s and Men’s Tests were against Pakistan, and this tour will only strengthen that bond.’

Pakistan has indeed loomed large for Ireland, as it was the 2007 victory over Inzamam ul-Haq’s side that woke up the world, and most of this country, that there was a decent cricket team here. 

That win spurred the progress that saw Test status endowed a decade later, and the professionalisation of the players.

The women’s side have made progress too, since Ireland beat Pakistan in two days at College Park in 2000. It was Ireland’s first Test, but also the last for both sides. Women’s test matches are rarely played anymore, and then only on a one-off basis between the bigger nations.

Ireland have had a women’s side on the world stage since they first played at a World Cup in 1988 — two decades before the men —but have slipped down the rankings.  

Cricket Ireland was spurred into action by the fallout from the 2018 World T20, where Ireland lost all four games heavily, and four senior players retired. Chief executive Warren Deutrom explained: ‘We committed ourselves to a journey to professionalise women’s cricket. It was not only a good thing to do, it was the right thing to do. We’ve seen the incredible growth and professionalisation of the women’s game across several major nations like Australia, England and India and the strong focus on female cricket in the new ICC strategy. It’s now Ireland’s turn.’

Earlier this year Cricket Ireland unveiled its first full-time professional contracts for women as part of a €1.5million investment package. Seven women — Delany, Waldron, Shauna Kavanagh, Sophie MacMahon, Cara Murray, Celeste Raack and Eimear Richardson — have full-time deals while there are nine smaller contracts for students including the upcoming stars Gaby Lewis, Orla Prendergast and Amy Hunter. Head coach Ed Joyce also signed a three-year contract extension.

Their profile was raised further this summer with visits by Australia, Pakistan and South Africa, with a notable T20 win over the latter the highlight.  

Joyce’s side has a strong backbone of experience with Delany and Waldron winning over 150 caps, and Richardson and Kavanagh more than 100. Lewis, too, has played 100 times for her country, despite being just 21 years old. She has blossomed into a star player, scoring six hundreds this summer and playing in The Hundred, the televised English competition.

Lewis insists she is not interested in playing full-time abroad or following the footsteps of Kim Garth who moved to Australia and is now with the Melbourne Stars alongside another former Irish international, Una Raymond-Hoey.

‘No, I’m happy playing for my country – ideally I could play for Ireland and in franchise leagues if I can get to that stage,’ says Lewis. ‘But being around the Irish girls is where I’m happiest. I would love to go over and play another season in Australia but I do love playing with the Irish girls and they’re my best friends.’

Lewis has no fear heading into this testing series in Pakistan, saying ‘Before we would have felt second class coming into games against big teams. Not quite beaten before the game but almost. Before the South Africa games we were so confident — but we were underdogs, not expecting anything so if you do well it’s a bonus.

‘We’re still learning but I think we’re bridging the gap to the top, it was huge turning over South Africa with eight of our players unavailable.’

Ireland are missing promising medium-pacer Georgina Dempsey who has her Leaving Cert this year, but can call on the excellent all-rounder Prendergast and batter Amy Hunter.

They will take heart from their bowling display against Pakistan in July, keeping them to 92-5 off 14 overs in a rain-shortened game. Ireland were strolling at 74-1 but couldn’t bring it home.

The games in Lahore will all be shown live on Pakistan Cricket’s YouTube channel with Irish globetrotter Andrew Leonard on commentary. ‘This is incredibly historic for Ireland,’ Delany said yesterday. ‘Hopefully the games will bring out lots of young girls to support Pakistan and it will be a competitive series.’

Pakistan are warm favourites, but they can be erratic — they beat India at the Asian Cup last month and then lost to Thailand. They eventually lost the semi-final to Sri Lanka in a last-ball thriller.

‘Ireland will be quietly confidfdent of picking up wins. It should be an experience like no other,’  says Leonard.

The Gaddafi Stadium — its name is likely to change shortly —was renamed in honour of the former Libyan leader Col Muammar Gaddafi after he gave a speech backing Pakistan’s right to develop nuclear weapons at a meeting in the city in 1974. It had a capacity of 63,000 when it hosted the 1996 men’s World Cup final but now holds 27,000.

How large the attendance is this week will be watched closely in a land where women still struggle for equality and where women’s sport was discouraged until a generation ago.

And the performances of Ireland will be watched closely here, with great hopes for an improving side who will also be keen to lay down a marker for their game against Pakistan in Cape Town in February at the T20 World Cup.