Dubai, February 4: “The impact of Twenty20 format will produce huge scores in the 2011 World Cup,” Brian Lara, the legendary West Indies batsman, told Gulf News.
Lara, who is the third highest scorer in the World Cup behind Sachin Tendulkar and Ricky Ponting, is here as the batting consultant of the Zimbabwe team who arrived for the pre-World Cup training camp at the International Cricket Council (ICC) Global Cricket Academy.
“As times goes by the scores in the World Cup too has improved. Look at the past World Cup and now and we find that the scores are getting bigger and bigger. This time there will be big influence of the Twenty20 games which has been played extensively in the last few years.
“A score of 250 that looked really good 10 years ago are no longer safe totals. Now every team aims for a total of over 300 to feel comfortable,” added Lara, who has scored 1,225 runs from his five World Cup appearances and hit four centuries and six 50s. His 23-ball half century against Canada at the Centurion in the 2003 World Cup is among the quickest 50s in the World Cup.
Lara has played in 34 matches, five matches behind Ricky Ponting and Glenn McGrath for the most World Cup matches by a cricketer.
Based on his experience what does he feel that Zimbabwe need to do to for a good performance in the World Cup?
Improvement is key
“Zimbabwe should aim to improve with every game. Even if they start on a high they should continue and improve. They should make sure they do it by bisecting their performance and doing it better the next day. That is how the World Cups are won by teams that peak and maintain momentum as the tournament gets on,” said Lara.
“Sporadic performance will not win anyone the World Cup. I would like Zimbabwe to start off well against Australia, who are obviously one of the best teams in the world. Zimbabwe’s performance graph should keep rising and not falling. It has often happened to some of the weak teams, who after playing one or two good games, play a few bad games and lose everything. In World Cup, the performance graph should keep going up,” he added.
Lara knows the sub-continent conditions very well. “To do well in the sub-continent, attention needs to given to all departments — not only on the field but even with travelling, getting up in the morning to train, the food, adjusting to the atmosphere and crowd.
“They need to be as strong as possible even mentally to block out everything and concentrate on the game. Zimbabwe have about six games to qualify for the quarter-finals and I don’t want them at any point of time not to be at their best. They need to maintain their nutrition level too very high,” said Lara, who looks fit even at age of 41.
Young squad
Talking about the Zimbabwe team, Lara said: “It is a pretty young squad. Their strength will lie on their ability to play every game on its merit. There are some inexperienced players too and in the next two weeks before the tournament they should grasp as much as possible from the group that is around them and get acclimatised to the conditions. They need to make sure to raise their level of performance by 20 to 30 per cent in all facets of the game,” he concluded.
–Agencies