AHMEDABAD, (Reuters) – Australia are treating Thursday’s World Cup quarter-final against India as a “mini-grand final”, coach Tim Nielsen said on Tuesday.
“The adrenaline will certainly be flowing and playing in front of their home crowd in Ahmedabad will be exciting and a challenge for us. We’ve got no fear now; we know we’re in the knockout stage,” Nielsen told reporters.
“It’s exciting…a mini-grand final in itself. If you came here and thought, ‘What would be the best result? It would be great to make the final against India’. Well, we’ve got our final against India in the next few days.”
The 42-year old English-born coach said the home crowd would add to the pressure on India.
“I’m sure if we’re on our game, they won’t necessarily be looking forward to playing against us. That’s something in our favour,” he said.
“It’s (playing at home) a huge factor for them. There’s some pressure there and if we can start the game well and maybe quieten the crowd that will play on the mind of the Indian team.
“The media and the public scrutiny will also be so great that you’d expect India to have most of the pressure on them.”
Nielsen said Australia’s best chance of gaining an upper-hand would be by making early inroads into the Indian batting.
“The importance of a quarter-final and the stature of a match will mean they are switched on,” he said.
“But if we can make some early inroads into their batting — (Virender) Sehwag, (Sachin) Tendulkar, Virat Kohli and (Gautam) Gambhir have played really well for them — we’d like to think that would be a benefit for us.”
SUPPORT FOR PONTING
Senior Australia batsman Mike Hussey jumped to the support of out-of-form captain Ricky Ponting and said he would prove his mettle in Thursday’s quarter-final.
Ponting has now gone 17 ODI innings without hitting a century and has not even hit a 50 since June last year.
The 3-1 Ashes drubbing at the hands of England and the end of the 34-match World Cup winning streak against Pakistan on Saturday have only compounded Ponting’s problems.
Accordingly the 36-year old, chasing a hat-trick of World Cup titles as captain, faces his most challenging days as the national skipper.
But Hussey is still ready to bet on his captain finding his form soon.
“Ricky’s got our 100 percent support,” Hussey said.
“He’s such a class player. It’s amazing, it seems like he’s been copping criticism over very minor things. Things have been blown way out of proportion from our point of view.
“I’ve been watching Ricky in the nets and the way he has been preparing.”
Hussey, who returned to the side after an operation on his ruptured hamstring to replace injured paceman Doug Bollinger, said he felt Thursday would be a big day for Ponting.
“It’s just amazing, sometimes, how champions just rise to the occasion at the right time. Against India on Thursday in the World Cup is one of those times where I think we’ll see the best of Ricky Ponting,” he said.