ICC T20 WORLD CUP 2022

October 27, 2022

Gary Wilson

Melbourne Cricket Ground

Ireland

Pre Match Media Conference

Q. Tomorrow you have a very important match against Afghanistan. You have played very well against England. But tomorrow a team which is a lower stage in the ICC ranking, and you're mostly at the same level. So how do you see tomorrow against Afghanistan, because Afghanistan have two very good spinners, and you have played yesterday well against fast bowlers of England. So would tomorrow be difficult for you against the spinners Rashid and Mujeeb, best spinners of the world?

GARY WILSON: We know Rashid and Mujeeb very well, having played a lot against them over the last number of years. You're right, they'll pose a different threat to what England posed yesterday. However, we do have our plans against them. The pitch out there didn't take a huge amount of spin yesterday.

And we hope that the ground will suit our play. And as I said we have played against them a huge amount of times before. So we've got our plans.

Q. Now it's always a tough crowd. It's open because Australia already lost one match, England lost one match. Do you think you have some more chances than yesterday after the yesterday game, you have more chances to come in the semifinals?

GARY WILSON: Look, we take it one game at a time. I think if you had looked at the first few games, we would have wanted to get off to a better start than we did against Sri Lanka. But Ireland against England is always a great encounter, and I think we showed our work yesterday. To be honest, we're not looking too far ahead of the game tomorrow. And let's see what happens and where we sit after that game.

Q. Domestic cricket in Ireland, cricket is not a big sport in Ireland. After yesterday's game, do you think in Ireland now cricket will be more focused by the media than in the past?

GARY WILSON: It's a difficult question because whilst it's not a huge sport, not one of the maybe top two or three sports, but it's definitely growing. And I guess everyone has to start somewhere.

I think it might have been maybe seven or eight years ago that our domestic structure started over in Ireland. And it's gone from strength to strength. And we're now responsible for producing our own players and sustaining them rather than the best players, best young Irish players, going over to play 20 cricket in England.

That can be seen as a challenge. But it's also a great thing for Irish cricket because that domestic structure becomes stronger and hopefully that will continue to grow over the next number of years.

Cricket, it's a small community in Ireland, but it's a very vibrant one. And it's a close-knit one. And I think we are well aware that we've got the backing of everyone.

Q. After yesterday's big game, what is the mood in the camp? And you're playing a match against -- who is the whole mood in the camp; I'm sure they're all celebrating, excited. It's a (indiscernible) camp. What is the whole environment, what's the whole feeling after you guys went back?

GARY WILSON: It was obviously a big day for Irish cricket and Irish sport in general. I think anytime you beat England, especially at one of the most iconic grounds in the world, is always a good one. But we are very focused on the rest of the competition now. Yesterday's gone. And, look, we enjoyed it. We had a nice time with some family for an hour or two whenever we got back to the hotel last night. And we enjoyed the success together. But the group are very, very focused on the next three games.

Q. What are the takeaways from yesterday's game and what are the areas that you'd like to work upon that will you follow it, do you think that's in particular -- I'm sure there's been discussions about the finer points.

A. We're always looking to improve. I think if you look back at yesterday's game, we dominated large parts of it for 12 of our innings and we played almost the perfect game. And for I would say even more than that of variance, I thought our bowlers were outstanding. I think the last eight overs of our bat innings. And obviously the rain came at a time when we needed the break because Moeen was in and starting to go.

But I don't think anyone could argue that we thoroughly deserved our win yesterday. And that was -- huge amount of credit to the guys, the way they performed. It was a quick bouncy deck. And obviously Mark Wood bowling quickly, and I thought our batters really set the tone. We have spoken a lot about throwing the first punch. We got our captain, we want to stand toe to toe with him. The way that him and Paul set the tone with the bat I thought was outstanding.

Once we sat that platform, we got a little bit unlucky with the ride with Tucker. And unfortunately after that we lost wickets quite regularly, weren't able to really capitalise on that platform. So that's something that we'll be looking to improve on tomorrow.

Q. You were obviously a member of the 2010 team in Guyana when we were playing against England. Does it give you extra set of satisfaction that we got our revenge yesterday, 12 years on?

GARY WILSON: That seems like a long time ago. I was so pleased for the lads yesterday because I think after getting through the group stage, from where we were and after 10 overs against Scotland, I think I was talking to someone after the West Indies game, and I think gave us a one percent chance of qualifying after 10 overs against Scotland. To get through that and then beat West Indies, get into the Super 12s, where we firmly believe we belong, and then to put in the performance we did against England, was just so pleasing. Really, really delighted for the lads that they're now showing the world stage what we're all seeing for the last 12 months.

Q. Would you say that's our best win in T20 cricket, better than the West Indies, even though we didn't actually finish the match yesterday?

GARY WILSON: It's hard to compare. Even all the good wins over the years, I don't really like to compare because it's now getting to the stage where, when do we stop talking about big wins and when do they just become wins? Because it is happening sort of semi regularly now, and that's where we want to get to.

We don't want to be all shock Ireland win again. It's now happening a little bit more. And with that becomes a little bit more responsibility and a different pressure.

Like I said to one of the questions earlier, just sort of taking it one game at a time. Trying not to compare too many results over the past because they were all great days in their own right.

Q. Your captain played another very good innings yesterday. After probably his second in three games, said after the West Indies game that you had actually helped him. What exactly -- can you give us an idea what you said to him, what you worked on?

GARY WILSON: With Barry, he's a form player. He's shown that through his career. When he gets on a couple of good scores he can tend to go on a big run.

But like the other guys, you want him to play to his strengths. If he gets out, playing to his strengths. And I think everyone, the coaching staff, the captain, the other players, you can deal with it.

It's almost, you're sitting in the dugout and you know what each individual player is thinking and what individual player is going to do.

If they get out playing to those strengths you can deal with it. Couple times in the summer he went away from those strengths. I sort of tried to keep it really simple as possible with him and the rest of the guys, to be honest. But huge credit to the way he's gone about it because captaining in your country in the World Cup on the biggest stage against one of your biggest revalues to go out there and play a match winning knock, all the credit really deserves to go to him.

Q. Biggest difference probably in this improved form of the team in general is that the power hitting, we've got power hitters basically all throughout the team right down the order. You've working hard on that over recent times?

GARY WILSON: Yeah, I look again -- you talk about taking just good options. Scoring quickly can mean different things on different grounds.

And I think the beauty of it, the way we reacted, it helped us that we played a warm-up game here. Undoubtedly, we got to look at the dimensions of the ground and look at the way the surface played. And batting at the MCG is very, very different than batting at Hobart. And I'm sure it will be different batting at Brisbane and Adelaide as well.

It's about assessing those conditions as quickly as possible and playing your game accordingly. We'd be foolish to play the same way in Hobart as Melbourne. The dimensions of the grounds are so much different.

And I think we can take out of that as well the we played in our first 12 overs yesterday. While we didn't quite get it right for the last eight, but let's hope tomorrow we can put a more complete batting performance and whether that setting or chasing.

Q. The spinners that got the wickets caught in the deep with Pierce off the slow bowling, hard to clear those huge boundaries at MCG, isn't it?

GARY WILSON: Yeah, I think it depended on the length as well. We saw the other day against our India and Pakistan, when the spinners came on, I think Axar Patel bowled, and he got hit for three 6s in the over. However the bowler bowls and whether we'll see more spin, I think length is key. And I guess that goes for a lot of grounds around the world, but it's especially key here whenever the square boundaries are so big.

And people will look to punish you as soon as you come full. And I think we've seen that in all the games so far. But I was especially pleased with the way our guys attacked especially in that first 12 overs. Something we talked a lot about was not trying to muscle the ball too hard and using the pace of the English bowlers.

As and I said before, the way the guys set the tone up front, it really sent a message to the rest of the group as to how we wanted to play.

Q. What do you think -- how tough a side of Afghanistan is for you?

GARY WILSON: We've played a lot against Afghanistan in the past. So as I said, we're under no illusions how good a side they are. I think every team that gets to the Super 12 in the World Cup is going to be a tough challenge and Afghanistan are no different.

Q. Do you consider Afghanistan as your big rival?

GARY WILSON: Well, because we play against them a lot, we know them very well. It's always a good series. It's always a tough encounter. Usually the matches are pretty close, and we'll be expecting no different.