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ICC WOMEN'S WORLD T20

February 22, 2020

Sophie Devine

Perth, Western Australia, Western Australia

New Zealand - 131/3, Sri Lanka - 127/7

Q. Sophie, congratulations on the win. Yesterday you told me that you'd be nervous, and I'm not sure I believe you now.
SOPHIE DEVINE: No, trust me, I was, especially the start they got with the bat. I thought we did a great job to pick it back. We knew if we got a couple of quick wickets we'd be in the game and could put the sort of strangle on them, but they certainly put us under the pump early on. It was great pressure for us to be under. And to hold them to mid-120s was really good.

I thought at the start they bowled particularly well. I thought me and Priesty struggled to get the ball away. I think both of us like to be scoring boundaries, and they contained us really well. And it sort of took a bit of a shift in mindset to just working the singles and the twos and the game opened up from there.

Q. You must be pleased with your team performance -- Hayley taking some really good bowling figures as well?
SOPHIE DEVINE: She was fantastic. She came on and bowled the best out of all of us. She was just really clear and simple. I think the thing here at the wicket, sometimes you get carried away with trying to bounce people too much with the swing and the pace. But she was just really simple.

Hit the bat hard and bowl in good areas and put them under pressure. She was fantastic today. I think it was those sort of contributions -- Maddy Green as well with the bat was fantastic, and she probably won't get much of the credit, but those sort of small knocks are really the glue that holds together an innings like that.

Q. I think you're on 19 when you got dropped. What was that like, experiencing that end and going on with the job?
SOPHIE DEVINE: Yeah, geez, you've just got to ride your luck. I think it's cricket a little bit. Sometimes they catch them. Sometimes they don't. It's sort of about making them pay. Pretty fortunate to get another opportunity and certainly wanted to, I guess, put my head back on and make sure I was there at the end of the game. It's cricket -- sometimes it goes your way; sometimes it doesn't.

Q. At what point did you feel comfortable out there that you felt you had it under control?
SOPHIE DEVINE: I probably thought that over Maddy, free hit, hit for 6, I thought that probably shifted momentum back to us. And to pick it back to sort of around six, I thought it was very manageable from that stage. But I thought it was still really teetering. I thought they bowled particularly well, again. And it did, it took an over like that to sort of break the game open and get ahead of it.

Q. How nice was it to open the tournament with a win and not have that pressure straightaway on you?
SOPHIE DEVINE: It's massive, I think. You always want to get, I guess, some points in the bank early on in the tournament. And we knew how hard Sri Lanka was going to come at us. So it was great to be able to put up a performance like that. We were put under the pump, which I think was a really good thing, how we handled it.

We'll certainly reflect on that. We've got a couple of days now to think about how we can tweak things as we move to Melbourne. We'll certainly get together as a squad and talk about what went well and what didn't go too well and move ahead obviously to a big game for us against India.

Q. And how about that game against India? Obviously they're coming off a great win against Australia. What do you think are the keys to beating them?
SOPHIE DEVINE: Yeah, they had to play (indiscernible). Probably a good start, I think. All I'll offer is a fantastic game of cricket to start the tournament.

India really deserved it with the way they bowled, stuck with it, similar to us. Australia got off to a flyer and they stuck with their guns and managed to pick them back. And the way Yadav has bowled, I think she's quality. She's hard to face. When you're only 4-foot (indiscernible), it's pretty tough to figure out a way to combat. That's certainly going to be a lot of our discussions, how we play against her. I think the wicket will maybe be slightly different at Junction Oval compared to what it was in Sydney, yeah.

I think as well you can't just focus on one person. And any of these teams, obviously India, have got a lot of threats, not just with the ball, but obviously with the bat as well.

Q. Most people have said sort of Australia or India and India were likely to get to the semis. Has that motivated the team a little bit? Do you think you've been written off?
SOPHIE DEVINE: Doesn't bother us too much. We'll just fly under the radar, I think. Pressure is on them. We'll just go about doing our business. We can keep ticking off wins in the bank. Pressure is on other teams to do what they have to do. We're just happy. I guess, Kiwis typically just fly under the radar and go about our business.

Q. Congratulations for extending the world record. The inclusion of Rachel Priest has been one of the key points as far as the World Cup squad goes. How does her inclusion, her presence in the T20, set up, bolster the strength? And what do you personally expect of her? Have you had any conversations with her since her comeback into the T20 setup?
SOPHIE DEVINE: Yeah, I'm really close with Rachel. She obviously plays domestic cricket with me as well in Wellington and we have a close relationship, played a lot of cricket with her. We did. We certainly missed her when she was out of the New Zealand side.

So they welcomed me back into the fold, particularly for some pinnacle events coming up. But certainly adds a lot to this team. And it's not just what she does with her bat, how aggressive she is. It's sort of what she offers behind the stump. I still think she's one of the best keepers going around. She has fantastic hands. And certainly her knowledge and experience and her competitiveness, I think, that certainly can't be underrated, the way she gets into games. She's really got that mongrel. And you value that particularly as a captain but also as a teammate. Sort of pick you up. She offers so much to this group.

And she's always the first one to pat you on the back and to pick you up and go with you. And players like that are just so valuable to this team. So I know not just me but the whole group is just so excited to have her back in the New Zealand setup.

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