Tag AUSinENG2012

Australia’s explosive batsman David Warner has stated at a press conference that he plans to counter-attack England’s bowlers, making a point that the Australians were ready for them. He also said that he wouldn’t hesitate to use his switch hit on the hosts.

Warner, who scored a fine 74 in Australia’s warm-up match against Leicestershire, has predicted that England will use Samit Patel to bolster their spell as well. Warner’s switch-hit has challenged the game’s bowlers and lawmakers for quite some time now, having first showed its effectiveness in T20 club competitions and unleashing it on R. Ashwin’s bowling in ODIs when India toured the Aussies last year. He also added that if English skipper Alastair Cook handed the ball to Graeme Swann when Warner was at the crease, he would not take long to pull out his weapon, which was also made famous by the English batsman Kevin Pietersen, who retired from ODIs not too long ago.

“If I get the opportunity and they're willing to put Swanny on early, I'll definitely be playing the switch-hit. It has to be a period in the game where it's necessary for me to play it. If I find I'm bogged down a little or if I find there's a scoring shot or I want to move a fielder, I'll play that shot so he has two men behind point.

“That's in the back of my mind, what I want to do to manipulate the field how I want to work it. I think they might play two spinners against us, I think Patel will come in and they might only play three quicks. So it depends where we're playing as well, but that's what I think they're going to do and obviously the switch-hit probably might come out,” he was quoted.

In the warm-up match against Leicestershire, Warner opened alongside Aussie wicketkeeper Matthew Wade and was unsure if Wade would accompany him as an opener in the ODI series or if he was going with Shane Watson. However, he looked comfortable and confident on the softer England pitch in the match.

“Obviously for my game it's trying to pull it in a little bit because it does a lot early, especially in Durham it's going to in the morning. But I have to keep going about my game how I do, and if it requires adjustment then I'm going to adjust,” he added.

England meanwhile, are wary of their #1 ranked opponents. They dispatched their video analyst Gemma Broad to Leicester during the match to take footage of Australia’s bowlers, paying particular attention to youngster James Pattinson. Eye level footage of bowlers helps teams with the use of the Pro-Batter device, which projects a bowler's action onto a screen before firing a ball from a bowling machine at a point of delivery calibrated to match that of the real thing, thus recreating the feeling of facing an opponent. Warner though, was not concerned.

“Just think it's giving her something to do actually, to be honest,” he said.

“That's what happens, we get all the footage anyway, it doesn't matter ... she's probably just doing some extra work. There's a data program around the world that all the countries get and we use anyway, so there's nothing that we haven't seen before.

“She'd definitely be trying to get some extra footage of us in these conditions. Definitely some of us never playing before in England so they probably want a bit of footage for us, but at the end of the day they've got to stand up at their mark and bowl at us.”