Daniel Vettori and Brendon McCullum
McCullum and Vettori talk about the crowd, Southee's bowling and the upcoming matches.
Daniel Vettori
On the crowd and atmosphere…
“That’s the best crowd I have played in front of in New Zealand and possibly one of the best crowds I have ever played in front of. That last ball that Tim Southee bowled in the main part of the game I couldn’t hear anything, it added to what was an amazing game of cricket as well.
“Brendon’s innings set it all up and Australia’s fight back to pull themselves so close and then Tim Southee under pressure for a young guy to step up and basically bowl 11 out of 12 yorkers which gave us a chance in the eliminator and then he bowled another amazing over so a great game of cricket, everyone involved will always remember it.”
On the possibility of being beaten at the end…
“I was pretty confident in Tim, he has stepped up throughout that HRV Cup and whilst its not the same as playing in front of this sort of crowd and against Australia with that pressure, I thought he could do it and just needed guys to back him up at the other end and that’s probably the bit that let us down a little bit. Nut to reiterate his three overs, including the eliminator over, along with Brendon’s innings were the reasons we won the game.”
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On having Bond bowl the super over…
“I definitely contemplated Bond. I spoke to Brendon and Ross and they both thought that Tim had hit 11 out of 12 balls and that’s almost unheard of under that pressure situation. He did the job for me and I backed him to do it again. I don’t think he missed a ball in the eliminator over so its one of the main reasons we got through on that last over.”
On the upcoming matches against Australia…
“The game tonight really sets up the summer. I know people will be extremely excited about it. Zealanders want us to beat Australia in every sport so to have a game like that in front of a crowd like that will be talked about for a long time and that will take hopefully the whole country in to the One-Day series and they will be looking forward to it.
“Any time you win against a great team then you start believing and the guys who performed today especially, will think they can continue to do it and you just hope you get other guys to step up along the way.
“Australia’s team changes quite a bit compared to ours so we are going to have to get ready for some new players and be ready for them because they have played exceptionally well by winning as many One-Dayers as they have in a row.:
Brendon McCullum
On his batting and choice of shots…
“It’s a bit instinct sort of thing I think. Its not for everyone but I guess it certainly helps when your trying to face a guy of that speed rather than try and hit them back over his head - I think its easier to use a pace. Its not always going to work but fortunately short boundaries here, it managed to come off.
On choice of Shaun Tait as the bowler for super over…
“I think if we had someone in our team that bowled 160kph we may have chosen him as well.
I thought they were always going to choose him.”
On what goes through your mind when you are on a roll…
“Its one of those things, I guess, I have scored some great twenties over the years as well, been got out when your feeling good, trying to be too aggressive and I guess you need a few things to go your way to go on to make a sizeable contribution. What goes through your head is that you are confident but you are still always aware that you have got to play with risk. I guess the hardest thing is to try and balance that risk with the aggressive nature as well.”
