AUCKLAND, New Zealand - Chris Morris say he and his fellow Proteas bowlers will have to be creative
in the way they adapt to the Eden Park field dimensions in the one-off T20
International against New Zealand on Friday.
The multi-purpose venue, which
houses straight boundaries of between 45 – 55m, will pose a unique challenge to
the bowlers, all of whom - except for Imran Tahir - will be making their debuts
at the ground.
Morris says the attack will have
to plan accordingly to counter the boundary dimensions and conditions, with
weather forecasts predicting some rain on Friday evening.
“It’s my first time in New Zealand and it was a bit of a
shock to my system when I got here yesterday to see the straight boundaries,”
he said.
“Every stadium has its own
dynamics that we have to get used to so we will put the training in to
try and hit certain areas. It does change it a little bit but you have to adapt
to every field that you play on.”
Morris enters the series full of confidence following his
career-best figures of 4/31 in the fifth Momentum ODI against Sri Lanka last
week. He emphasised the need to start the tour strongly given the short
turnaround of the schedule and the washed out T20 warm-up match on Tuesday.
“It has its positives,” Morris said of the rained-off match.
“We would have liked to have played but in saying that we have played quite a
lot of cricket in the recent weeks so it was quite nice to relax, to get the
body going in the gym and to get a bit of a rub from the physio. It was a
blessing in disguise, that is how I’d like to look at it.
“We have to keep it basic. We have all
accepted the fact that it is going to be a quick turnaround, we knew that we
wouldn’t have the usual recovery time coming here on a tour. We have a no
excuses policy; we knew there was going to be a bit of jetlag which we got over
quickly but as soon as the game starts we are there.”
The Proteas’ last outing at the venue ended in a dramatic
four-wicket loss to the hosts in the ICC Cricket World Cup semi-final in 2015,
but they do take some consolation of winning the last T20I between the two
sides in 2012.