On the subject of 'blow-ins' - players born overseas and adopted by their current countries - an eagle-eyed reader at local blog Slugger O'Toole has
tallied them up (comment #4) for England and Ireland:
We fielded
Andre Botha; Transvaal, RSA - married to an irish woman, dual citizen
Trent Johnston: NSW, AUS - married to an irish woman, dual citizen
Regan West; Taranaki, NZL - residence
Alex Cusack; QLD, AUS - residence
We could in theory have played Connell, whose also a kiwi
England fielded
Jonathon Trott ; Cape Province RSA
Matt Prior; Transvaal, RSA
Owais Shah; Karachi, Pakistan
12th Man - Eoin Morgan, Dublin, IRL
not to mention they could have played Kevin Pietersen (RSA), Andrew Strauss (RSA), and Ed Joyce (IRL)!
Indeed, at the last T20, only India had a squad containing no “blowins” (Even the aussies originally named Symonds, who is english-born)
Also interesting to note that it was Eoin Morgan's apparent saving of a six that won the match for England (Morgan is, of course, a recent adoptee for England, having been Ireland's top batsman until he was named in England's squad for the World T20 this year) - except that eyewitnesses say the ball had crossed the boundary. Hadn't seen that from where I was in the ground. Robbed by one of our own, you could say.
