Ireland captain William Porterfield has urged his teammates to hold their heads high after being knocked out of the World Cup.
The Irish failed to reach the quarter-finals on Sunday as they suffered a seven-wicket defeat to Pakistan in Adelaide.
However, following his century against the Pakistanis, Porterfield believes that Ireland can be proud of their efforts in the competition.
"It is nice to get some runs but never nice to be on the losing side. We are disappointed not to have got more runs but they bowled well," he is quoted as saying by BBC Sport.
"It is disappointing to go out on net run rate but the way we started is good and we continued well with the batters stepping up and getting runs. A lot of credit goes to the bowlers as well for toiling away.
"We have shown - as have all the qualifiers - that we deserve to be here. We have to give credit to ourselves on the way we played and we have to keep improving."
The quarter-finals of the World Cup get underway on Wednesday when South Africa face Sri Lanka in Sydney.
Jack Prescott
