Photo Credit: ICC
Australia captain Aaron Finch says his side will stick to their guns as the battle for qualification goes down to the final day in Group 1.
Finch and his men take on the West Indies knowing a positive result will go a long way to ensuring their passage to the semi-finals with England and South Africa facing off later on Saturday.
Australia recorded a decisive and crucial victory against Bangladesh, chasing down 74 in 6.2 overs, and will hoping for more of the same against the reigning champions in Abu Dhabi.
“You’d love to keep it in our control, that’s all you can focus on,” Finch said.
“As soon as you start hoping other teams win or other teams lose, it just clouds your judgment and your vision.
“It’s really important that we just go and stick to our guns, stick to our process because we know that’s good enough when we get it right.
“West Indies are such a dangerous side, we saw that when we played them. Obviously with them being out of the competition now they’ve got nothing to lose, which can also be a really dangerous spot.”
The West Indies defeated Australia 4-1 in a T20I series earlier this year with Hayden Walsh Jr taking 12 wickets, and Australia will be wary of him again tomorrow.
“We expect him to come back into the side. He had a sensational series against us over there,” Finch added.
“I do think we’re better equipped to deal with that at the moment. Obviously having played him before in a five-game series there’s been a lot more information sharing amongst the boys and chat about that.
“It just comes down to being able to perform your best game on the day. That sounds pretty basic but that’s what it comes down to, and as long as we can keep our intent, keep our energy, I think that goes a long way to us giving ourselves the best chance of winning.”
West Indies will be eager to end their tournament on a high having picked up only one win during a limp defence of the trophy they memorably won in 2016.
And Shimron Hetmyer, who made a sparkling 81 off 54 balls in a losing cause against Sri Lanka on Thursday, hopes to back up that display as he targets consistency.
Hetmyer said: “I’m trying to be as consistent as I possibly can. It really helps with the overall performance of the team, with having consistent batters in the team and having players who put up their hands more times than not.
“[It] will really help in us going forward knowing we have another World Cup coming up pretty soon and then we have all the series to play as well.”
Name of Author: ICC
The International Cricket Council (ICC) is the global governing body for cricket, founded in 1909 as the Imperial Cricket Conference. Renamed the International Cricket Conference in 1965, it became the ICC in 1987. Headquartered in Dubai, UAE, the ICC has 108 member nations.
