"Tomorrow is a big game. We are jelling quite well as a team, and we are a confident lot. We don't fear anybody. We are here to play good cricket, we don't look at Australia as a huge team. We will give it our best shot, and see how it goes," Irfan Pathan said, ahead of Saturday's Twenty20 World Cup semifinal against the World champions.

"We are very confident after yesterday's win. We were confident earlier as well, but they way we fought yesterday was incredible. There were contributions from all players, and as a unit, we all feel very good. We will try to do even better tomorrow," Pathan added.

The Baroda all-rounder has had a great time of it with the ball in this competition, not so much in terms of wickets as in sustaining the pressure created by the new-ball duo of Rudra Pratap Singh and S Sreesanth. "I have been out of the team for the last six months, and in that period, I have worked on my action. I have worked on my non-bowling arm. I was with TA Sekar and Dennis Lillee at the MRF Pace Foundation for a month, and that stint really helped me.

Match practice
"I bowled a lot of overs. I also toured Zimbabwe and Kenya with the India 'A' side. You can practice as much as you want in the nets, but there is nothing like bowling in matches. I came here feeling quite confident about myself.

“It is never nice not playing for your country, but the six months away was a good learning experience. The lesson I learnt was that if you don't perform well, you won't play for the country. All said and done, time away from international cricket did help me, though like I said before, it is not a nice feeling to not play for India."
Pathan singled out his spell of 4-0-16-0 against South Africa on Thursday as his best effort to date. "The top two had done a wonderful job, and the pressure was on me to keep up the good work. I didn't get too many wickets, but I didn't go for many runs either. The ball was swinging a bit and I was bowling in good areas."

From himself being a new-ball bowler, Pathan is now first-change behind R P Singh and S Sreesanth. "Whatever the team decides is fine by me," he said. "The opening bowlers are doing a wonderful job."

India came into the competition with minimal expectations. Ask him what has catapulted the team to the semis, and back comes the reply, "We are batting really well and bowling well too, but the most important thing is our fielding. We are fielding very very well. All three departments are clicking at the same time."