Speaking after the last-over defeat to England, Santner said New Zealand would feel the pressure while closely following the Pakistan vs Sri Lanka clash.
Having lost the opportunity to make the semi-finals on his own terms, New Zealand captain Mitchell Santner admitted the team will be nervous on Saturday while watching Pakistan take on Sri Lanka in Pallekele.
Speaking after the last-over defeat to England, Santner said New Zealand would feel the pressure while closely following the Pakistan vs Sri Lanka clash. The situation is clear for the Kiwis: Sri Lanka beat Pakistan and they are through to the semifinals. But, if Pakistan win with a handsome margin and leapfrog New Zealand, they will qualify.
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“Pretty nervous. There’ll be some nerves watching tomorrow, just to see what happens. But it’s out of our control, we can’t really do much. We are just going to wait and see, and either get on a plane to India or New Zealand. We would have made things a lot easier if we won tonight,” he was quoted as saying by ESPNcricinfo.
With England needing 43 from last 18 balls, New Zealand were firm favourites to make the semi-finals. But the tables turned in the 18th over, delivered by Glenn Phillips, who was blasted by the pair of Will Jacks and Rehan Ahmed for 22 runs in a decisive over.
“We had it in our control. We did a lot of good stuff throughout this game, and even in the last couple of games, but it’s always those little moments at the end, or throughout our innings, where it could have been a little bit sharper, whether it’s execution or in the field. But credit to England for setting up that chase like they did,” he continued.
In Santner’s opinion, the key reason England managed to regain control of the game and win it was because of their batters, with Jacks and Rehan taking good options.
“The way [the batters] attacked the last overs of our spinners was [because] they took very good options. The flip side with us at the death while batting was we tried to go a bit squarer where they [England] looked to go straighter. Those are the kind of things you can look back on especially in a tight game like that: whether it’s a matter of a few runs or whether it is stopping a two or a catching opportunity or something like that,” he concluded.
While England, led-by Harry Brook has already qualified for the semifinals from Group 2, it is still not confirmed who will take the second spot.
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