Mutual respect and guarded optimism of Kane Williamson and Eoin Morgan stood out on the eve of the New Zealand-England World Twenty20 semifinals at the Ferozeshah Kotla ground on Tuesday.
Williamson maintained he was not surprised by England reaching this far in the competition. “Having played a bit of county cricket [in England], I have seen all these guys quite a lot, how good a players they are. When I saw the team on paper, you knew it was going to be a tough challenge. They play aggressive cricket and fearless cricket.”
On his part, Morgan said, “We’ve got a tough game tomorrow against a really strong New Zealand side that played probably the best cricket of the group stages. So we have to come up with a very strong game of cricket tomorrow to beat New Zealand.”
HORSES FOR COURSES
Williamson said that he would pick his team based on the opposition and the conditions like he has done throughout the tournament. “We simply try to pick ‘horses for courses’ on conditions against opposition in any given time. That certainly won’t change in terms of that philosophy,” he said.
“They bat very deep and that’s the strong part of their side. We have to focus on how we play our cricket, what suits us, make our decisions,” Williamson added.
Morgan did not reject the possibility of New Zealand fielding fast bowlers, Tim Southee and Trent Boult. “I don’t think we can rule anything out. Their game plan throughout the tournament has been to go with frontline spinners, which has worked for them. I’ll leave that up to them.”
He downplayed New Zealand being the favoured side to win the semifinal clash. “To be honest that doesn’t really bother us. We went into the Sri Lanka game as favourites. It is going to be a tough game of cricket. I hope the wicket is as good as it looks and yeah, may the best side win.”
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