Knight confident of strong World Cup showing
Knight's side were recently humbled 12-4 by Australia in the multi-format Ashes series and will need to recoup quickly if they are to reclaim the trophy they won on home soil in 2017.
But Knight thinks her side can take plenty of positives away from their performance against Australia and is confident of a strong showing in New Zealand.
"As a group, we need to reset and refocus after an Ashes series that didn’t go our way," Knight said.
"I was really pleased with how we started the series.
"We went toe to toe with Australia and heading into the ODI leg of the series the scoreline could easily have been different to the 6-4 deficit we found ourselves facing.
"As it was, there just wasn’t enough mental energy to go back to the well and fight back in the ODI series.
"A multi-format Ashes series is incredibly demanding and when you throw in COVID it becomes tougher again.
"That’s no excuse – we didn’t deserve to win the series – but I think it goes some way to explaining our performances across the last two ODIs which I don’t think were befitting of the team that we are.
"I want us to use that in the World Cup – there’s lots we need to take out of the Ashes to come back tougher and more united in order to try and retain our trophy."
England are currently quarantining in a New Zealand hotel ahead of their first warm-up match for the ICC Women's World Cup against Bangladesh in Lincoln on February 28.
The reigning World Cup champions then take on South Africa at the same ground on March 2, prior to reuniting themselves with Australia once again in their first match of the 50-over showpiece in Hamilton on March 5.
Knight said her teammates have been using some left-field ideas to keep spirits high during the quarantine period, but that everyone was looking forward to leaving the hotel and returning to training.
"We’re obviously looking forward to being allowed back out to train,” she said.
"Some of us cope better than others in quarantine but we’ve been trying to keep busy.
"We’ve been up to our eyebrows in crosswords, Sophie Ecclestone has been running HIIT classes on Zoom, Freya Davies organised a brilliant quiz (including ‘Guess the baby picture’, which was brilliant) and I’ve taken some inspiration from watching a documentary on the first all-female crew to take part in the Whitbread Round the World Race. It’s called Maiden and it features some amazing women – a documentary that I would very much recommend."
