ICC T20 WORLD CUP 2022

October 17, 2022

Phil Simmons

Bellerive Oval

West Indies

Post Match Media Conference

Scotland - 160/5, West Indies - 118

Q. How do you sum up that performance, especially the collapse after the very good start?

PHIL SIMMONS: I think the only way you can look at it is disappointed. I think our batting, at least today, definitely was a bit unprofessional. And we need to wake up and start being as professional as we can be when we are batting.

The bowlers seem to be working hard and putting us in good positions but the batters continue to falter.

Q. It's happened before, like you said. You see you guys in training, you're spending a lot of hours hitting balls. What has happened? What happened today?

PHIL SIMMONS: I don't know. We haven't started the inquest in the dressing room yet. Let them calm down a little bit first, or let myself calm down a little bit first before I go into the dressing room.

But I think it's just too many soft dismissals. I think as batsmen you have to pay a lot more attention to your wicket. And I think every time, we play we are up there with the run rate. It doesn't matter who we are playing against, but we keep losing wickets and soft wickets. So I think that I've been trying to remedy it for the last couple of months. Doesn't seem like it's there yet.

Q. Some have said that it could have something to do with the tinkering of the batting order, batters playing in different positions in different games. Do you put it down to that at all?

PHIL SIMMONS: Well, I don't think so. I think it's a case where, in this game, people need to be able to go up to make a difference. You go up, sometimes a batsman goes up and he has to prepare his side with 10 balls, 15 or 10 balls, 20. So guys have to bat in different positions.

Today there was no real different positions. I think guys are batting where they're strong. We talk about looking at data and looking at different things. Guys are batting where they are strong. So I don't think that would be used as an excuse today.

Q. You walked out there, I think, during one of the rinks break, I think when Jason Holder was still out there. What was the message? This is in the midst of all that collapse happening.

PHIL SIMMONS: The message was that we need a partnership. The partnership out there, to bat until at least about over 15, because we still had the two out there and we still had (indiscernible) Alzarri Joseph, who could hit the boundaries we needed. So that was the message.

Q. You talked a little bit about soft dismissals. Could you expand a little on that? Are we talking about shot selection? Like maybe the guys, one or two dismissals that were taking along the longest part of the ground and maybe when the game situation didn't require that type of risk?

PHIL SIMMONS: You summed it up there. You don't need me to answer it. And that's exactly it. You've got to sum up the situation and play to the situation of the game. I don't think we did that at all times today.

Q. In terms of positives, you started off a little bit expensive in the powerplay, but the rain delay seemed to help you a little bit. You managed to call batsmen momentum after the break?

PHIL SIMMONS: We did. As I said before, the bowlers have been doing an excellent job. I think if we look at the stats and the data, if we know we're 7 to 15, we've been doing very well for the last year. So for them to pull it back after that it was expected from us. So I think they did a great job.

Q. Does the short turnaround now, does it help getting back out there quickly on Wednesday?

PHIL SIMMONS: I think it helps. A day tomorrow to just rest and reflect on how things went, what we have to change and how we have to think in the next game, because as someone said, we've been out there; we've been hitting balls. We've been practicing scenarios. We've been thinking about it. It's now to put it into play.

Q. Does being in this position now with the weather forecast later in the week is bad, do you still think about you need to beat Zimbabwe and beat them well because your backs are against the wall a little bit? Do those conversations come into it more?

PHIL SIMMONS: We need to beat Zimbabwe first. We think about everything else. We need to beat Zimbabwe. I think that's the first step as we go along. When we get back here at this time on Wednesday, then we may be thinking a lot different on all those things you spoke about.

Q. How important is it also to not even think about the possibility that you don't get out of this group into the next stadium? This is just one game now, because he said the turnaround is so quick, how important is it to not get into that mindset at all?

PHIL SIMMONS: No, you can't get into that mindset. You have to think about Zimbabwe and how we're going to beat Zimbabwe. It was last year, Bangladesh and them, they lost the first game and they still ended up in the Super 12. So we've just got to think about Zimbabwe right now.

Q. A word on Scotland, what are your thoughts on their performance and sort of how much have they and sort of similar teams of their ilk improved over recent years?

PHIL SIMMONS: I think they've all improved. I remember when I was at (indiscernible), we keep saying the level of cricket you give them, they're going to improve. I think they're getting a lot more cricket at that level now. So you see the improvement. So they're all improving.