ICC T20 WORLD CUP 2021

November 4, 2021

David Wiese

Sharjah Stadium

Namibia

Pre Match Media Conference

Q. How has it been, this tournament, for you, personally?

DAVID WIESE: It's been amazing for me just being back. Playing international cricket again has been an awesome experience for me. To play with a team like Namibia that's got a lot of talent, a lot of potential there, to help those guys out and to make it into the Super 12 stage has just been actually amazing for us.

Q. What are your thoughts ahead of the game tomorrow?

DAVID WIESE: We know New Zealand is a tough opposition. They've got world-class players there. And again been seen as the underdogs in the game, but we've played the games at Sharjah. Played a bit of success at Sharjah, and we think it's a wicket that could shoot our type of bowling. So we've done our prep. We've got a final training session this afternoon. We'll go there try to nail our skills.

And T20 cricket at the end of the day, you know, one person can take the game away from the opposition. And if it's your day you can stand up and be that man of the match performance and you never know what can happen.

Q. I'm so happy to see the performance of Namibia. The way they're performing. So I just want to ask one thing, how you keep your momentum high while playing every game. And how was your preparation on the prematches like when you get the gaps during the matches of the World Cup, how do you keep yourself cool and composed during the matches?

DAVID WIESE: In terms of the preparation, you try and do as much analyses of the opposition that you're going to be facing. You try and assimilate that in the net as much as you possibly can.

So, for example, against Pakistan we knew that they had some fairly quick bowlers, Shaheen and Haris Rauf, some of the quickest in the world. We tried to simulate that, face some quick bowling and some quick throws, to get your body used to that.

Now against New Zealand it's going to be a different challenge, different opposition. They're more swing bowlers with Trent Boult and Tim Southee at the top of the innings. We've got to nail down that skill again.

Every single time you go into a game, you have to try to give yourself the best chance. That starts with the training and preparation. That's what we've tried to do. We've tried to keep things as simple as possible and be fairly specific in the way we go about our training.

Q. Tomorrow's New Zealand, but then you play India next. Any thoughts ahead of that?

DAVID WIESE: Look, you want to kind of not get ahead of yourself and focus on every game at a time. But from the start, when we qualified for the Super 12s, the possibility of us playing against India, it's exciting. They're a world-class team. And you know it's going to be -- it's going to be a big game for India leading into the phase of the tournament that we're in now.

So from the start that's a game that everybody's been looking forward to. The opportunities you get to play against the guys best in the world, face the best bowlers.

It doesn't happen often for a team like Namibia. We're just embracing that challenge. The guys are looking forward to testing their skills out against the best in the world, whether it's on the bowling side, bowling to Rohit, Virat, KL, all those guys. Batting-wise, having to face Bumrah and having to face Ashwin, coming and bowling nice, as well as Jadeja, all those guys, they're top class players.

You never know, opportunity might come your way. You put in one or two good performances and other opportunities could come in. That's the exciting part for us playing against India on Monday.

Q. You've been nominated for ICC Men's Player of the Month. Any thoughts or reactions to that sort of nomination? Fans will be listening in on Facebook live as well. So any messages for them?

DAVID WIESE: No, just thank you for the nomination. I'm humbled to be part of the players that have been nominated. Some quality players, Asif Ali and Shakib, both quality players.

So to be recognised amongst them, it's a privilege also. And just thank you. It's been a good month.

Performance-wise, Namibia got into the Super 12s and put in one or two big performances. And that was the main thing for me. Our main goal coming into the World Cup was to qualify for the Super 12 so we wouldn't have to play qualifications for next year's T20 World Cup, and we achieved our goal in that.

To be able to play a part, even if it's just a small part in Namibia qualifying and moving forward, getting more opportunities, I'm really proud about that.