WEST INDIES Women’s all-rounder Hayley Matthews said the team is not under much pressure, despite suffering a second straight defeat in the ICC Women’s World Cup in New Zealand.
The West Indies began their World Cup campaign with victories over hosts New Zealand and England, but were comprehensively beaten in their next two matches, by India and Australia.
They will be looking to atone for those defeats when they face Bangladesh on Friday (6 pm on Thursday TT time), followed by encounters against Pakistan and South Africa.
The top four teams, in the eight-team tournament, will progress to the semi-final round.
During the post-game interview on Tuesday, after the seven-wicket defeat to Australia, Matthews said, “I don’t think there is too much pressure. Coming into this tournament, we knew our first four games are probably going to be our four hardest.
“I think we (literally) said to ourselves, if we could get at least two or three wins over these first four games we will be in a really strong position and we’ve done exactly that,” continued the experienced Matthews. “I think, looking at the rest of the games, these are games that we should expect to win. If we go there and we can win all three of our games, we will be qualifying for the semi-finals.”
She added, “So I don’t think there’s much pressure at the moment. We know that we have the kind of team once we go there and we play our best cricket we’ll get the wins on there. So yeah, no pressure, just a matter of going out there each and every day and taking it one game at a time. Obviously and yeah, just performing as best as we can.”
Looking ahead to the Bangladesh match, Matthews said, “Every team we play, we’re looking to go down playing our best game. They’re a good team. They’ve been scoring, probably about 200 runs every game which I guess it’s good to see (the) development of (their) game.
“But, when we go there, we’d like to play as hard as we would play any other team. And yeah, just looking to go there and try to execute our plans as best as possible.”
The West Indies are currently in fifth place on the standings with four points.
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