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ICC WOMEN'S WORLD T20November 21, 2018Heather KnightMark RobinsonNorth Sound, Antigua and Barbuda Q. Heather, you've been in Antigua a couple of days now. What have you specifically been focusing on, working on ahead of the semifinal tomorrow? HEATHER KNIGHT: Obviously we look to the team we're going to face, we played India in a warm-up game earlier in the trip. And we've seen the tactics they're using. They've been very effective taking pace off the ball. So we'll also look to that and how we're going to go about playing it and how we are going to have our method to score runs. And obviously they've got some really dangerous players. So in terms of how we bowl with them and little things like that. It's quite nice to be able to focus on that semifinal and really have specific practise in terms of how we're going to play against them. Q. Mark, how disappointed were you with how the team played against West Indies and what did you say to them during the performance? COACH ROBINSON: I wasn't disappointed. No, you can't live in a black and white world where you win, you're proud; you lose, you're disappointed. Look, it was a game in the end we should have won. We knew that. I think if we took a couple of catches we would have won it. But we showed a hell of a lot of resilience to get the score which was more than competitive in the end. And then bowled really, really well for the majority of it, and I think if we had a tad more look as well, we would have won. But sometimes things don't go your way. And if it wasn't for a couple of dropped catches we would have won the match. I was proud of the resilience they showed. I was proud of how they stuck at the task when not everything was going their way. Q. Has the team been working on fielding specifically? And Heather especially mentioned the difficulties of fielding under lights with dark skies. Has that been something you're working on? Obviously those are the conditions you'll be facing tomorrow. COACH ROBINSON: We'll be under lights tomorrow. It's windy outside now. The two catches would find a couple of players nine times out of 10. That was a difficult catch no doubt for anybody, any cricketer at any level because that went a long way and it was swirling wind, black sky. A lot of things happen, mistakes happen, especially in an atmosphere like that. It was a brilliant learning experience for everybody. I don't think I've ever been on a ground as loud as that. And the West Indies are a very physical team. Got some outstanding athletes that put you under pressure. That's what you want as a team, you want to be put under pressure to learn and get better. Q. This is a little bit of a grudge match following on from last year's World Cup final. Heather as a team do you take confidence from your performance in last year's final going into tomorrow? HEATHER KNIGHT: I think we take confidence from the fact that we performed in knockout matches before but I don't think it counts for anything obviously with the game tomorrow. It's a different format, different team for India, different captain for them and things like that. It's all going to be about tomorrow. We know T20 cricket, it's whoever turns up on the day. Any sort of player, if they put in a really strong performance, can win a game for their side. So, yes, doesn't count too much for tomorrow. It's about us going out and putting on a really strong performance, showing the good things that we've done. Like Mark said, the fight we've shown in the last game will stand us in really good stead and we know we can get over the line when we do come across those tight games. We've had a lot of experience of that in the last sort of 12 months or so, 18 months. So, yeah, it's all about tomorrow and how we perform. Q. Some different conditions out here compared to what we've seen in St. Lucia. To what extent might that influence your selections in terms of the bowling and Jenny Gunn and Tash essentially playing? COACH ROBINSON: I don't know. We'll have to see tomorrow, get an indication we're practicing tonight, how much it swings and those type of things. St. Lucia was difficult for all the batters. It was a difficult batting surface. I think all the batters and all the teams would have liked to have played better. But we have to say it was too paced and at times it gripped. And it was hard work for the batters and we've been looking at footage of Guyana with the outfield a bit quicker and everything else. I think it might have been a different case for all the teams there to play in that spot. So all the teams are going to adapt to what we think is going to happen in Antigua. So we played here against West Indies in a warm-up game, so we have some type of idea of how that wicket will play and we'll pick a team accordingly to hopefully win the match. Q. Kirstie Gordon had to leave the field in the previous match. Is she completely fit to play? COACH ROBINSON: We'll know more today. She'll practise fully. We gave her an extra day off yesterday. Had quite a troublesome travel day -- when did we travel, whatever that day that was, stuck in an airport. And then we couldn't fly and they sat here. We just gave an extra day to recover yesterday. It was a precaution. And hopefully she'll take a full part in practise tomorrow and put her hat in the ring to be fully fit and play a major part. Q. You guys had a look at the pitch today? HEATHER KNIGHT: Had a quick look now. Obviously we haven't seen the wicket before today. And so we'll obviously have an idea with the game before us how it's going to play, whether it's going to turn, whether it's going to swing, that sort of thing. We've had a little look and we'll have to see how it plays tomorrow. Q. And you said you take confidence from your record in knockout games. Would you say the England team does better in crunch games towards the back ends of tournaments? HEATHER KNIGHT: I think we've had some really good experience from those sort of crunch games. Obviously that game against South Africa, we knew pretty much was a must-win game straightaway, the second game in the tournament, and it was straight into crunch time. And obviously that World Cup last year found us in great stead in terms of we won quite scrappy games we probably shouldn't have won. We know we have the characters in the fight in the dressing room to be able to do that. And yeah, it's all about tomorrow. We know we can do that. We've just got to put ourselves in a position to be able to fight and hopefully get it going. Q. For the knockout game, does the team train differently? COACH ROBINSON: I think that's a danger as a coach, you want to always keep things as normal as you can. We spoke before the West Indies match because we knew we were going to get unique experience, which is very hard to prepare for. So you just -- all you can do is try and keep things as normal and try and encourage your players to stick to their processes, really boring cliché word, but it's really true. Everybody knows the magnitude of the game. It's just trying to keep things as simple as normal because a team that will deliver the simple things the best will probably win the match. Q. Some teams have been talking about how they train with a lot of noise, music, to sort of simulate crowd conditions. Not maybe in this tournament, per se, but in general, is that something that England has ever looked at? COACH ROBINSON: Nothing will prepare a player for that noise that you have every day. And some people revel in it. And some people sometimes shrink. I was really choked with my team that they didn't. They didn't shrink, didn't shy away from the ball. Dani Wyatt, we focus sometimes on a couple of dropped catches. Dani Wyatt pulled off two absolute outstanding catches, one in front of a packed stand. So it's just cricket. Sometimes mistakes are made. Sometimes people manage to pull things off. So tomorrow will be no different: It will be about which team delivers the better skills at the better time. Q. What is the balance between mental preparation and technical preparation before a crunch match like this? HEATHER KNIGHT: Every game you prepare for England, you prepare to play, you prepare mentally. You do your visualisation, how you're going to go about things. And obviously skill-wise in the nets as well I think. It's about keeping it as much like any game you would play for England. I think if you start doing different things before a big game, that's when you might get yourself in trouble. But the girls have learned from the other day. I think the experience the other day in front of 10,000 people -- the hostility of that crowd is going to be a great learning experience for some of the younger girls on the team and even for some of the older ones. That's the second biggest crowd I've ever played in front of. Whether that comes into the semifinal or down the line, that's going to be a really useful experience for us. It's about taking what you can from that as a player, how effective -- how it helped you. Whatever it might be. And trying to take it into future games. Q. You've been predominantly spinner attack in this tournament. Playing against a team tomorrow that plays spin well. How much changes in the bowlers' preparation, whether their lengths, their lines, because Indians play spin very differently from, say, the West Indies? COACH ROBINSON: Yeah, the challenge for any bowling attack, any bowler, is to adapt to what's happening in front of you. Because we lost a warm-up game because we came out of a tenth in England, and a lot of our support bowlers haven't got any overs, match overs. I think Jenny Gunn has got three overs, match overs, and Tash Farrant has bowled three as well. So our options are potentially a little bit limited by that in times of match readiness. We play Dani Hazell to get into the competition to give us a good option for tomorrow as well. So we always talk about the correct lengths to bowl. And we'll also talk about the right lines and the right fields to get for particular bats at given times. But on the pitch, it's up to the batsman -- sorry, it's up to the bowlers to adapt to what's happening in front of them. And sometimes you can't be too formulated. Q. You mentioned Dani Wyatt's fielding as being exceptional. She scored, obviously, a brilliant hundred against India earlier in the year. How important is it for as a batsman at the top of the order to perform tomorrow? COACH ROBINSON: Bat super form. Dani has got -- I want to say a hundred against India, hundred against Australia. And Tammy got a great hundred during the summer. But Dani Wyatt has got good memories of playing against India. And she'll carry that confidence into tomorrow hopefully. But as I say, you want one of your top four, in particular, to go on and score a match-winning contribution. Q. Do you know the 11 yet? HEATHER KNIGHT: No. We've only looked at the pitch. And like Mark said, we've obviously brought Dani in for the last game to see how she goes and to give her a bit of match time. But no, we'll make a final decision after training today. Q. You probably got asked this in St. Lucia, but there's been a lot of down time in this tournament. How has the team been spending their time? Like even yesterday or the day between practise and the game, when you go back from training. HEATHER KNIGHT: Had practised down time when it's raining in St. Lucia. I think we were practicing. I think the right balance is the play, you want to find the balance between preparation and being ready but also trying to switch off a little bit, trying to get away from the pressures. But haven't done too much outside of cricket training. We had a bit of a social get together last night, a bad shirt night. It was a lot of fun. Me and Mark were in the top four. We were quite pleased with our performance and choice of shirts. But obviously the main thing is being ready for that big game tomorrow. Q. What did the both of you wear? COACH ROBINSON: Not the same shirt. (Laughter) FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports   |
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