"We aren't ready" - Paddy Upton recalls how, at one point, the team management thought India might not win the 2011 World Cup
Team India's mental conditioning coach Paddy Upton revealed that 10 months before the 2011 World Cup, the Indian team management believed that the side weren't ready to win the competition.
In a video uploaded by cricket.com/tv YouTube channel, Upton stated that everyone on the coaching team, including head coach Gary Kirsten, feared India might not win the title at one stage.
He suggested that it was because the Men in Blue were under immense pressure to perform well as they were playing in front of their home crowd.
Upton stated that India were the home side and it was also going to be Sachin Tendulkar's last-ever World Cup appearance. He pointed out that they had to keep these things in mind while preparing for the crucial encounter.
Paddy Upton explained:
"It was on the morning of the Asia Cup final, 10 months before the 2011 World Cup final, we were preparing to play Sri Lanka in Sri Lanka. The question that Gary Kirsten asked was, if this is a World Cup final, are we ready as a team to go out and win? Gary and I, along with Eric Simmons, all of us said, 'No, we aren't ready to win a World Cup final'.
"The thinking was that because of the amount of the home pressure, and when we extrapolated that, it was very clear that playing the final at Wankhede, which is one of the noisiest stadiums, and Sachin Tendulkar's last World Cup game, there would be higher pressure than what any of those players had played under or would play under in the rest of their lives.
"We had to prepare for the highest pressure situations that any player would have played under."
The MS Dhoni-led side ultimately went on to win the 2011 World Cup final against Sri Lanka. The hosts chased down the target of 274 set by Sri Lanka in the summit clash at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai to lift the coveted trophy.
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The @cricketworldcup 2011 Final well and truly lived up to the hype.
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"A fair degree of winning that game had already been done before we arrived" - Paddy Upton on India's preparation for 2011 World Cup final
Paddy Upton further added that in all the team meetings, the support staff would ensure that they talked about India playing the final at the 2011 World Cup.
He opined that because of this approach, the players were mentally ready for the big game, as they had discussed it again and again.
"Every single team meeting, we would start with, 'When we play the final in Mumbai' or 'When we play the final on the 2nd April'. So that by the time we got to that place, it had been in the players' minds over and over.
"Going into that final, we probably experienced less pressure than what most teams have experienced going into final because we were so mentally prepared for that moment.
"Half the battle is won if you can arrive at a moment that big and not be overwhelmed by the magnitude of the situation. A fair degree of winning that game had already been done before we arrived."
Excited and privileged to be back in #TeamIndia colours, working alongside long time colleague, friend and Head Coach Rahul Dravid. Much of our journey was thanks to @rajasthanroyals twitter.com/rajasthanroyal…
Paddy Upton recently began his second stint with the Indian side. He has been roped in as the mental conditioning coach for the national side till the duration of the upcoming T20 World Cup 2022.