Matthews: Assessing new conditions will be critical

VADODARA, India:

West Indies Women’s captain Hayley Matthews believes the side which quickly assesses the conditions at the spanking new Kotambi International Cricket Stadium will emerge victorious in the first One Day International (ODI) today.

The venue, which can host 40,000 spectators, will host its first international match when West Indies face India in the opening game of the three-match series.

Speaking in a pre-match press conference yesterday, Matthews said quickly adapting to the conditions would be the Windies’ main focus.

“It will come down to who assesses the conditions better. So hopefully, we are able to go out there and adjust really well.

“It’s a new ground and very unknown, so we’re going to have to be sharp when it comes to the mental side of the game and figuring out what we need to do in order to play some really good cricket,” Matthews said.

“We haven’t played on it yet, so I don’t know exactly how it is going to play. I always love an even competition when there’s a bit in it for the bat and the ball. I think I’m speaking as an all-rounder saying that.

“But hopefully, it is a wicket that can produce a bit on both ends to make it a really competitive game,” she added.

The visitors enter the match on the back of a 2-1 defeat in the preceding T20 series.

However, Matthews said despite that result, the Windies were still confident of winning the ODI series.

“Playing against India, it’s always going to be really tough, but we’ve got a squad full of really great players as well who are quite capable of coming down here and being successful.

“I think we showed in that second T20 that we are a competitive team, who when we are at our best can beat anyone in the world,” Matthews maintained.

“So hopefully, we’re in that kind of frame of mind in that form of cricket throughout this ODI series and we can compete right through.

“We have to look at what went well in the T20 series and try to take the positives out of it and reflect on the things that didn’t go so well and try to sharpen out those areas.

“As a team we’re still pretty confident because like I said, we know when we’re at our best we can beat anyone in the world, so we just have to try to show up as early as possible,” she further added.

CMC