William Porterfield’s innate optimism embellished with his thick Irish accent came through loud and clear ahead of his team’s ICC World Twenty20 match against Australia here on Wednesday.
“We believe we can win the game. It’s as simple as that. We are coming up against a team that has been in a bit of transition themselves but they are a pretty good team.
“We are not taking them lightly but the way we have been playing, we are confident,” the Ireland skipper said.
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The ICC Twenty20 rankings that placed Australia below Ireland did not alter Porterfield’s perception about Australia.
“It (rankings) doesn’t really concern me. They lost a few games and, as I said, over the last couple of years there have been a few changes within their side but they can’t be taken lightly as they showed in that last game against Pakistan (at Dubai) which they won by 94 runs,” he said.
Porterfield said his side had hopes of scuttling the Australian top-order.
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“A lot of their players and a lot of their coaches are in the IPL. That gives a lot of the Aussies the experience of Twenty20 cricket.
“There is (Michael) Hussey, (David) Warner and (Shane) Watson, but others too have a lot of experience.
“I obviously wouldn’t mind seeing the back of those three early,” he said.
Last year’s victory over England in a World Cup game at Bangalore has also lent encouragement to the Irish ranks and Porterfield said: “The England game showed the kind of things that he (Kevin O’Brien, who scored a match-winning century) can do.
“A lot of people look back at that and realise that he is a game-changer.”