New Zealand wasted no time in gearing up for Tuesday's semifinal against Sri Lanka with a practice session at the picturesque P. Saravanamuthu stadium here on Sunday.
This will be the sixth World Cup semifinal for the Kiwis, and to proceed further they will have to negotiate, among far worse hazards, the clamminess of Colombo.
“It's warmer here than in Dhaka, but not as hot as Mumbai, so we are used to it. It is muggy too, but this is something you have to deal with when you go to the subcontinent,” said Ross Taylor, the team's leading batsman in the tournament with 288 runs.
New Zealand was the reagent that paralysed South Africa in the quarterfinal, and the upset win, Taylor said, had given the side a lot of confidence.
“It's going to be a new game, but we are taking a lot of confidence from our last match against South Africa. We have an advantage that we have played against Sri Lanka in the pool matches, and we did a few things wrong. Hopefully we can rectify that in the match on Tuesday.”
Learning
Murali claimed four for 25 as Sri Lanka beat New Zealand by 112 runs in the league phase. Taylor said that his team had followed portions of Sri Lanka's evisceration of England and that there was something to be learnt from that match.
“The way Trott batted is something we can take a leaf out of…the way they played Murali, because Murali was a big factor when Sri Lanka beat us in the last game.”
The World Cup performance has undone some of the damage that New Zealand's reputation of being a fighting ODI team had suffered following its humiliating tours of Bangladesh and India. Taylor said that the team actually enjoyed its perennial underdog status.
“Most of the time that we play, we are underdogs. It's something we almost enjoy and accept. I know a lot of teams expect to beat us.
“But we are proud of our World Cup history…looking at this team, we want to make more history and go one step further and make the final. We genuinely believe we can do that, and we want to show that on Tuesday.”
