JOIN USWhile maintaining that in knockout matches the familiarity of conditions mattered little in the outcome of the match, R Ashwin felt that India knew what to expect from the Sher-e-Bangla surface having played all their matches here.
“We know what to expect from this ground and the pitch, but, of course, when it comes down to the semifinals, it’s anybody’s game,” said the off-spinner on Thursday. “You can’t really say we hold a majority (of advantage), it’s just about anybody’s game.
Whoever plays well on that particular day will have the advantage. But yes, we do hold an edge having played so many games here. We know what to expect,” he remarked.
The 27-year-old also refused to drawn into a debate whether India had better spinners than South Africa. “When it comes to international cricket, there’s a very small margin in the quality between spinners,” he stressed. “Everybody’s bound to have a certain amount of quality in them. It’s all about the mental makeup of the spinner and what amount of guts he has in that particular scenario. It’ll be handling of the pressure that makes the difference because Imran Tahir has been in top form. And I expect (Aaron) Phangiso to play. When that happens, you’re pretty much evened out on the amount of spinners both teams will play. It comes down to how well your spinners handle it (pressure),” he explained.
The Tamil Nadu bowler didn’t read too much into South Africa’s poor record in ICC tournament knockouts. “They’ll have to use it (worrying about choking) for themselves for our advantage. We’ve not looked at things like what we’ve done in the past, holding all three titles. That’s our advantage. If they want to do it, it’s their problem.”
Ashwin was asked about leg-spinning legend Shane Warne’s visit to South Africa’s practice camp on Wednesday. “I don’t know what the South African management called him for,” he began. “Probably he could add value in terms of what he can do to a spinner. Probably (leg-spinner) Tahir could learn something from him. We’re just going to be guessing from a far distance, so we can’t really say how much of a difference he can create. He could have probably told what’s happening in Dhaka and those kinds of things could have helped them. Apart from that, I don’t know what he can do in a day’s time,” he wondered.