‘One defeat will not derail their campaign’ – Eoin Morgan on England’s defeat against New Zealand in World Cup opening game
Eoin Morgan (Source: Twitter)
England’s former World Cup-winning captain Eoin Morgan recently analysed England’s performance against New Zealand in the opening match of the ODI World Cup 2023. Previously, England lifted the World Cup for the first time under the leadership of Eoin Morgan at their home in 2019, after beating New Zealand.
New Zealand and England met for the first match of the tournament on 5 October, where New Zealand beat England by nine wickets as they failed to dismiss any other batsman after Will Young. Eoin Morgan analysed that this one failure in the first match of the tournament will not give a setback to England and they will move ahead with a positive mindset.
“I don’t think anyone could have foreseen the Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 opener playing out quite like that. New Zealand had an incredible day and for England, it was a crushing defeat. Even if they had scored 30 more runs to get up to a par score, I don’t think they bowled well enough to defend it, which makes it harder to take”, said Eoin Morgan.
Eoin Morgan on England’s failure against New Zealand
“In many ways, New Zealand didn’t get them out, they got themselves out. But credit has to go to Devon Conway and Rachin Ravindra played. Conway put England under pressure from the very first ball and for Ravindra to play like that on his World Cup debut was exceptional. He was pure class”, added Morgan.
“From an English perspective, we have come to have a level of expectation in Jos Buttler’s team that regardless of the surface, he wants them to take an aggressive approach. We didn’t see that in a strong enough way and what this defeat does, in dramatic fashion, is emphasise the way to play throughout this World Cup. Their strongest suit going forward is to be more aggressive and I think that will be Jos’ message – we need to go harder”.
“One thing is for sure – one defeat will not derail their campaign. Eight of this squad were there in 2019, when we lost three group stage matches on the way to lifting the trophy, and they will definitely lean on that experience. There is no side that goes from start to finish at a World Cup without experiencing some sort of adversity, whether it’s losing games or having hiccups within games themselves. This will be no different”, he said.
