ICC 2011 World Cup - Brett Lee banking on the pace factor
Aussie pace spearhead Brett Lee has declared that searing pace does not necessarily rely on the state of the wicket, hence the Aussie formation of Shaun Tait, Lee himself and Mitchell Johnson is going to make life extremely difficult
for the batsmen from around the world even on the docile sub-continental tracks hosting the 2011 World Cup.
The Aussies have arguably the most potent pace attack in the competition which has more depth than the http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Morne-Morkel-c77722, the Pakistani attack of Shoaib Akhtar, Umar Gul and Wahab Riaz and
the English attack comprising of James Anderson, Stuart Broad and Tim Bresnan. What sets them apart is the extra pace that the three can provide together.
http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Pakistan-c755 only has a waning Shoaib Akhtar who nowadays occasionally nudges the 150 km mark, while the South Africans also have only one pacer Steyn reaching that mark, on the other hand the Aussie trio bowls around that mark consistently.
"I don't see any problem with the pace that we have and playing on slow wickets," Lee said. "At the end of the day, the ball is still coming at 150kmh through the air. The pitch is a massive part of the equation. But if you have a
bowler like Shaun Tait bowling around 160kmh at the batsman's toes, it doesn't matter where you are playing. It is still going to hit the batsmen on the full."
The Aussies are trying their best to deliver the psychological blow to the rest of the teams before they start their title defence, a few days ago Johnson had echoed Lee’s sentiments stating that none of the teams is keen on taking
on the pace trio, he stated that they were the most formidable bowling attack with the potential of wreaking havoc on their day.
The Australians have a good record in ODI competitions in India, in fact they have won two out of the three ICC events held in the sub-continent. Besides the triumph in the 1987 World Cup, they annexed the ICC Champions trophy in India
in 2006 that attack had some real menace in it with Lee in the company of one of the greats of all time Glenn McGrath, http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Watson-c96326.
http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Lee-c72382 hopes that the current trio backed by Watson can match the feats of the 2006 attack which was simply too good for most opposition even on docile tracks.
"For pace bowling you've got to get the ball in the right spot," Lee said. "The way we bowled in the Champions Trophy, with lots of pace bowlers, we won that event. Playing on slow wickets like in http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Delhi-c780 tends to suit our pace attack."
The Australians are bunched in pool A of the 14 nation tournament. They would be playing their pool games in http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Sri-Lanka-c758 and while India is set to provide the batsmen real scoring opportunities same cannot be said about the
pearl island that has endured one of the wettest spells in its history.
The persistent rains have meant that the preparations for the tournament have taken a real hit, it also gives a glimmer of hope to the bowlers who can expect an underprepared track or a green top in some of the games there.
If the likes of Lee, Johnson and Tait have a taste of that, they are most likely to make life miserable for the opposition and take their team deep into the tournament which would end with the final at http://www.senore.com/Cricket/Mumbai-c820 on 2nd April.
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