Four days after he questioned his players whether they are as good as they think they are, South Africa skipper AB de Villiers has rubber-stamped his initial analysis that his team is still the best in the tournament.
de Villiers said:
“I 100% believe we are the best team in the tournament here. Those two losses in the group stage did hurt us a bit but we are past that now. We know where we could have won those games and we weren’t that far off. We know we are very close… three games away from taking that World Cup home. The most important game is tomorrow but we know we are not far off so it’s important to be positive and still believe we are the best.”
Last week, former South African captain Graeme Smith said that Proteas hopes of winning the World cup could well be thwarted by their inability to chase down targets. However, de Villiers shrugged off the issue and expressed that it is their death bowling not the chasing that they need to improve upon.
“It’s not an issue. I believe we can chase down any total,” de Villiers said. “There is no special strategy. You have to do the basics well. We’ve done it in the last year a few times under pressure. We didn’t get it right the last couple of chases and that’s alright. I am still confident in the batting unit. I believe there are a few guys due for big runs and it’s going to happen soon at the right time.”
AB de Villiers also made it clear that South Africa will not “mess around too much with your best possible XI” against UAE because they want to finish the group strongly to challenge for the ultimate prize.
He added:
“If you look at the standings, if we win the last game we will be in a good position to go into the quarters with a lot of confidence. We would have liked to win the two big games against India and Pakistan but it didn’t happen that way and there’s no point sulking now,” de Villiers said. “It’s a very important stage of our World Cup now. It’s important to be confident and I still want the boys to believe we are the best, which we are. We are going to go into tomorrow’s game with that attitude.”
©Getty Images