Our hope for success in this World Cup will rest on Kane Williamson and Ross Taylor: Brendon McCullum
New Zealand captain Brendon McCullum has heaped praise on their star batsman Kane Williamson ahead of their Group A clash against at Dunedin. The Kiwis take on Scotland in their second match of the tournament and McCullum has said that he expects plenty of runs to be scored in this World Cup. He also mentioned that the first five matches have each featured a score of 300 or more, and this new trend brings new strategies into play.
"We've seen already that the wickets in both Australia and New Zealand are pure wickets, so it allows good ball striking and high scores to unfold. From a bowling point of view, you've got to make sure that you can attack. If you can keep taking wickets then you can limit the opposition's ability to attack, and that's one of our philosophies.”
"You've also got to have a calm take on it. When you are going around the park occasionally, it can be very easy to give up on an over, as a bowler. But geez, 14 off an over could actually be a good over in the grand scheme of things. You've just got to mitigate against those 25, 26, 27 run overs."
Kane’s impact on the game is better than Virat Kohli: McCullum
McCullum outlined Kane’s value to the team and their World Cup campaign, he said,
"Geez, it's scary to think how good Kane could be in the years to come, I wouldn't change him for anyone in the world at No.3. I guess a lot of our hope for success in this World Cup will rest on Kane and also Ross Taylor.”, he added, “How they perform in this World Cup will allow us to score the runs which our bowling attack will require to be aggressive and to be able to get the results we want."
"I guess I'm more familiar with Kane's game and his impact on our team than of Virat's, which is one of the reasons why I say that I wouldn't change him, Virat is an amazing player. His record is phenomenal already, and he's still such a young guy.”
"But what we're seeing with Kane at the moment is a guy who is incredibly comfortable with his game, who keeps trying to develop and learn. He works very, very hard. He's an incredible team man, as well, and I think we've seen that with some of his innings - he's looking to up the ante for the team cause rather than the chance for individual milestones."
Kane Williamson currently averages 46.46 and has a strike rate of 82.88 after 61 innings and has been one of the quickest improvers of the game in the past year.