CHENNAI: Former St Kitts and Leeward Islands top-order batter Ingleton Liburd said that the Canadian team need more experience, as most of their players don't play franchise cricket.
The Canadians play their first match against 2024 finalists South Africa on Monday at the Motera Stadium in Ahmedabad.
Liburd wants to use his previous experience as player and as adminstrator (Interim CEO and general manager of Cricket Canada to help the current squad. Ingleton assessed the team's performance during the warm-up window.
"Preparations have been good. Against Nepal, we were looking to bat first and put a score and hopefully we could have defended. Our captain (Dilpreet Bajwa) was not here at Chepauk because he had to travel to Mumbai for the captain's meet. So we had to bring in somebody else batting in his position. Generally we wanted the other guys to bat at a position where we are looking to get them to bat in the World Cup. We are just trying to make sure we get the right order going into the first game on the night," Ingleton said.
To acclimatize to conditions, Canada undertook a camp at Sri Lanka before the World Cup.
"Well, we didn't play a lot of matches. I think we needed to play more matches. Going there helped us to get acclimatized. The takeaways from there, I think everybody to me looks pretty good when we go to the nets and practice games. But I think we need to work on is the mental part of the game," said the West Indian born cricketer.
Most of the Canada cricketers in this squad have Indian roots. "Yeah, we do hear some Hindi music, Punjabi music, different types of music. The atmosphere is good. Everybody is excited because some of the guys are coming back home to play in front of their home crowd. But I think the excitement is wearing down now and they are getting down to the business of playing cricket," he added.
Another area of improvement that the team needs to work on is the exposure.
"One of the big challenges for us is our players don't get to play a lot of franchise cricket. We have a couple of them. We have at home the GT20, we have the Super 60. And I believe although we have come into a World Cup, to play against two associate teams, it doesn't help us. We should have played a match against atleast against a full member. Which is why I try and help give some experience and confidence to the players," he said.
Afghanistan was one such associate member and now, thanks to the exploits of Rashid Khan, they are one of the top sides in white-ball cricket.
When asked if Canada have such gamechangers, Liburd said, "Well, we have two players I want to say. Captain Dilpreet Bajwa, and Nicholas Kirton. These are two of the players in the batting area we look up to. We also have a couple of bowlers like Kaleem Sana. I think he's one of those guys who could do well with the ball," Liburd said.
Lower-ranked teams have history of giant killings. Take the 2009 Netherlands team upsetting England in England for example, or Kenya handing defeat to the West Indies in the mid-1990s.
"We are trying to do that (shock value). We're hoping that in the first game we come off with a good start. I know the last game we didn't look good. It wasn't good for us. But we're hoping to have that shock value," said Ingleton.
He then gave his assessement of the player's skill set.
"Skill set-wise, Canada, I think they're good enough to do it. The thing about it is putting an innings together and constructing. They're good enough to play 140 kilometres, to play the spinners also they can do. But the mental part of the game, playing against these top teams, is what's going to kill us. But other than that, I think the skill sets, we have enough skill to play against these players," he explained.