17 October - Chennai - Afghanistan Captain Hashmatullah Shahidi pre-match press conference
[Reporter:]
Congratulations on defeating, defending champion England.
So, how vital is this win for Afghanistan as you head deeper into this tournament? How is it going to affect your preparations and mentality as well? How confident are you now?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
Thank you very much first of all. I'll come to your question. Definitely it was a big win for us. England are defending champion. So that will give a lot of confidence for our team. And we had belief from the beginning of the tournament, but the first two games didn't go our way. But still we had the belief and as you saw that we beat England. So that will give a lot of confidence as a team to us moving forward for the next games. And we will try to maintain that confidence with us.
[Reporter:]
Back home you don't have that many facilities as you see in India and other parts of the country. How did you prepare for this tournament? And last game you gave a brilliant performance. How was that possible without any facilities at home?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
First of all, let me tell you about the facilities. Right now, we have good enough facilities to prepare ourselves. We have good domestic cricket also. If we want to prepare or arrange camps in our country, it's possible. Because in every city, in Jalalabad, Kabul, Kandahar, we have facilities, we have stadiums, we have academies. It's not like India but still you can prepare yourself on it.
We had preparation for this World Cup. Our preparation start from last six months. We had one domestic list A tournament so we started from there. Then we had Sri Lanka series Bangladesh and Pakistan then Asia Cup so after that we had a camp in Abu Dhabi. So, we are well prepared for it and looking forward inshallah to perform well in this tournament.
[Reporter:]
Apart from Rashid Khan, there are lot of your cricketers who play in other leagues across the world. So, when it comes to adjusting to the conditions, how much of an advantage does it have? You guys were able to read the conditions properly in Delhi as well and in Chennai, similar conditions that you find in Dubai, wherever in subcontinent. How much does it help for you to read the conditions?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
Only spin wise?
[Reporter:]
No overall
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
I mentioned this before as well like especially India you know this conditions India was our home for two or three years. So, we are used to with this ground. And also, I mentioned to that brother also, in our own language, that in this ground, we had a preparation camp for 2019 World Cup. We spent 40 days here. So, all these things give us a lot of advantage, especially in this conditions like India, because it was our home also and with that the condition is same to Afghanistan also. Like we used to with this. So that all gave us an extra advantage.
[Reporter:]
I mean, about playing in other leagues and coming to players in terms of adjusting to reading the conditions better than some other foreigners, like Sri Lankans and Bangladeshis.
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
I didn't get you. You know condition doesn't work with the leagues. I didn't get that.
[Reporter:]
Mujeeb has really improved a lot as a batsman. He scored that 50 against Pakistan as well and again against England good contribution today he was hitting a lot of sixes so can you just talk about how Mujeeb has improved as a batter and how much depth does it give to your batting with Mujeeb playing like this?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
It gives us a lot of advantage - Mujeeb he worked very hard in whenever he goes to his homeland, he is only doing batting you know in the nets. Here in the team environment also he always like keen to bat in the net sessions and he improved on his power hitting and I can say he will be nearly an all-rounder to us but he has to be careful not to hit wicket again because he did it twice in last couple of games.
[Reporter:]
During the captain's press conference in Ahmedabad two weeks back you spoke about how Afghanistan you said your batters will come to the fore and you said you will see a good Afghanistan batting performance. We have seen that in the last two games you have put good totals. But also, you were in good positions where you could have gone even above 300.
So just talk us through how the batting has come through and what are the challenges will be for the batters. Because the Chennai wicket might not play as good as what you had in Delhi. So, you might need to do a bit more adaptation in terms of tackling if it is slower and if it grips of the surface.
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
Yeah, I have talked about that but as a batting unit, if you want to be a good batting unit or a good team, first of all you have to adjust with the conditions, you know, like you playing in different stadiums different grounds different kind of pitches.
So, we know that Delhi pitch, we played two games there and both pitches had different behaviour. Against India, for spinning it was different. Against England, for spinning it was different. So, you have to adjust with those things.
Now we are playing in different ground as a batting unit, we talked about that and you have to think about all those things. That's why, this small difference makes you a good team. So that's why as a batting unit we have to focus and we are focusing on that, how to play here.
[Reporter:]
Are you happy – you said that batting will look good and they have done well? So far, so good, the first three matches, do you feel happy with your batters?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
I think the way our batting is, I'm not totally satisfied with that because in first two games and yesterday's game like one thing happening with us is like when one wicket falls down, so back-to-back wickets put pressure and that happening with us from last three games.
So, we have to and we talked about that and we have to like improve that area not to give pressure, give our team under pressure and not give back-to-back wickets.
[Reporter:]
[inaudible question]
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
Yeah, it was possible. Still, I will back my words, back-to-back wickets put us little bit under pressure and back foot. So, we are learning, we are thinking about it and we will try to improve it.
[Reporter:]
Jonathan Trott your coach actually said that on any given day we can beat anybody. It's an even-steven game. So, you have lot of players who have played IPL, people like Gurbaz who have already seen lot of international players, lot of players are playing leagues. So, after this win against England, how much confidence does it give for every individual saying that, okay there are people who have played IPL, we have people who have beaten international cricketers. Do you think this will help you guys cleanse that pressure moments? Say for example, the middle phase where you conceded only 28 runs and took 2 wickets. Do you think this win will again start putting more pressure on the opposition saying, okay these guys are world beaters. How much of that mental factor is going to affect playing Afghanistan again?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
See the league cricket it benefits our cricket. Like the players who played leagues, you know, that international pressure become little bit less with that because they used to with the players, big players - and also in here, like from the first game I was talking and everyone was talking, we are here to compete, and to fight with every team.
So that's our mindset and the last game that we won gave us more confidence with that. So, we will try to take that same confidence as a team with us and move on and we will try our best to lpay positive cricket here and win games.
[Reporter:]
Your thoughts on Rahmanullah Gurbaz, he has had a good few matches so far. How vital is he to your chances in the upcoming matches?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
See Rahmanullah is one of the players in our team who is I believe a match winner player. He can change the game anytime. You know whenever I am talking to him also, I am telling him that you are a match winner so he put a lot of impact on the games when he doing well so he did well in the last game also unfortunately he got run out and as like I expect that he will play much more than what he did in last three games in future games so whenever he do well, automatically our team will perform well with his performance.
[Reporter:]
Your openers Rahmanullah Gurbaz and Ibrahim Zadran have seemed to have exchanged the role of aggressor in each match. So, is there any specific game plan going in and around the openers that one opener will go for it and the other will play the role of anchor?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
It's not about any planning but we give freedom to every player like whoever go in he should play his own game so Rahmanullah and Ibrahim are different, have different role - kind of cricket they play. Like Rahmanullah is more aggressive and he whenever he is in, he always looking after score, and Ibrahim is the kind of player like he play on merit and he looking like for big innings and try to take time. So that's their own way of playing cricket.
[Reporter:]
So, what is the work going behind in your middle order because it will be gratifying for you as a captain to see your team standing two collapses against England and India as well but you have managed to keep your score at par. So, what kind of work you guys are doing to strengthen your middle order?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
See we did all our work, all our preparation, it's about the mindset. We know that we are doing very good at the top order. So, we have to take the responsibility as a player, everyone in the middle order. Everyone in the middle order. Like if we are doing the first phase very good so it's not like when your openers are doing well for first 20 hours then middle order collapse. So, this kind of play can't win you games. So, we think about that, we talk about that and it's about planning and it's about mental. So, we have to be mentally strong and take the responsibility as a player, everyone, especially in the middle orders, we have to do well to win the games.
[Reporter:]
What about your coach Jonathan Trott how much his presence and experience helps you to perform well?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
Jonathan is very positive person and very disciplined. He always wants us to be disciplined off the field, on the field. And his experience always worked and sometimes he go hard on the boys, sometimes he adjust himself like that's the way like if you see from last one and half years our batting has improved a lot because we know how to play according to the condition and also the most important thing is the discipline in the batting.
[Reporter:]
You mentioned how India provided practice facilities and how India used to be your home for 3 years. Apart from this, lot of Indians have worked with Afghanistan team as coaches in the past, even now you have Ajay Jadeja. How crucial is the role of Indians in the evolution of Afghanistan cricket?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
See, we had a coach in the past also from India and right now Jadeja. Specially if you see in India their batting is very good, you know, like whenever you see the matches of India in the past also, currently also. So that talks about batting and about team that helps us whenever Indian coach we have with us. And also, facility wise like we, India was our home so we have a lot of positives from here.
[Reporter:[
So, have you had a chance to look at the wicket? That is one. And the second one is, we see lot of middle order collapses in this tournament. For example, Australia played here 100 for 2 and then they collapsed. Sri Lanka, yesterday we saw collapse. As you said, your middle order. Do you see teams actually doing well in the first 15 overs and then get caught in the mind saying whether to go all-out attack or you know we see lot of wickets falling in the middle overs.
As a captain what do you think is happening when it is on the field as a captain or even as a captain sitting in the dressing room with the batting unit. What is your observation of this middle overs people losing wickets or trying to go all out?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
I think sometimes you know it's about the condition like against England I will give example the way we started you know it was looking like we scored 350 when their first bowler was bowling but when the spinners came that same wicket behave different and it's changed. And also from our experience, like here the wickets are slow and the ball gets rougher when after 20 overs - 25 overs. So, the ball gets rougher, it’s not traveling that much and it becomes more slow So I think in the new ball, it's easy to score runs on it when it's It gets older - older -older, so the score momentum comes down.
[Reporter:]
Did you see the pitch here?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
Yes, I saw.
[Reporter:]
Observations?
[Hashmatullah Shahidi:]
We will see tomorrow.