Brendon McCullum
The BLACKCAPS wicketkeeper-batsman talks about the victory over the Scottish, Daniel Vettori's injury and being percieved as underdogs.
On being nervous after the Scottish innings…
“Yeah it was, first of all we weren’t sure we were going to get a game at all. After watching last nights game we were pretty apprehensive about what was possible from a spirited Scottish side. The way they came out and batted was incredibly brave and free in terms of their mind and they certainly came hard at us, put us under a huge amount of pressure. At half time the boys were pretty nervous but we managed to show the skills we’ve got with the bat, show we do have some power hitters in our team and manage to get across the line really.”
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On the mix up that led to his run-out…
“My frustration was probably more about the fact that I would have loved to have been there at the end to make sure we won the game, but the way Ross finished it off I couldn’t be happier. I think those sorts of things happen and that’s part and parcel of the game.”
On Jesse Ryder…
“I guess it’s a pretty tough time for him - losing a relative in such a tragic circumstances. He has an amazing ability to concentrate on his task and feel at home out in the middle. We saw again today what the guy is capable of. He’s been working really hard and I think today was a small glimpse of hopefully what we’ll see from him throughout this tournament.”
On Daniel Vettori’s injury…
“Dan slipped over in training and injured is shoulder. He had an injection this morning but it still felt painful so hopefully with 36 hours to our next game he’ll be right for that. If not we’ve got to get our head around ways we can operate without him in that game against a very good South African side, but we’re all fingers crossed we get such an important player and our captain back for the next game and the duration of the tournament.”
On being perceived as underdogs in the tournament…
“Interesting. I guess today we were firm favourites to win but when a game gets reduced to seven overs per side the ledger becomes a little bit more balanced. I think we were pretty much expected to win this game and we expected ourselves to win the game. We managed to get across the line and in terms of the rest of the tournament how we perceive ourselves, we believe we can win it. we wouldn’t be here if we didn’t. We’ve got some exciting players who are capable turn games on their head and if we can concentrate on what we have to do in each game and each situation there’s no reason why we cant be there come final time. I guess the way other people perceive us is out of our control. We’ve played some good cricket for a while now and I think we are a dangerous outfit in terms of Twenty20.“
On being surprised by the Scottish team...
“No, not surprised us. I guess the seven over game definitely allowed them to play with a little more freedom. We knew they had some good players and we scouted them hard and knew this was potentially an asking game for us and knew we’d have to be efficient with what we did. Unfortunately we weren’t as good as we should have been with the ball in hand, I mean bar Ian [Butler], I think the rest of our guys didn’t hit anywhere near the areas or with the execution required. When your playing any team from around the world, particularly a team that’s prepared to play with that kind of freedom you’re going to run into trouble and that’s what we ran into today. Fortunately our batters were able to pull us out of it. If we bowl like that in the next game or further on the tournament we’re always going to be playing from behind and that’s something we’ve got to look at in the next 12 hours and make sure we rectify.”
