da leao： POTCHEFSTROOM, South Africa – Australia’s players were so tense duringthe early stages of the 1999 World Cup they couldn’t breathe ..
Will Swanton19-Feb-2003POTCHEFSTROOM, South Africa – Australia’s players were so tense duringthe early stages of the 1999 World Cup they couldn’t breathe … orplay.It was pure torture. The harder they tried, the worse they got, losingto Pakistan and New Zealand and struggling against a bunch ofmodestly-talented bravehearts from Scotland.It’s history, and something of a miracle, that Australia won the title.Those first few games were such an ordeal that Ricky Ponting’s sidevowed to avoid a repeat this time.They wanted to hit the ground running in South Africa, win the first twogames against Pakistan and India to blow off the cobwebs, then enjoythemselves.Mission accomplished.The Australians aren’t living and breathing the World Cup over here. Farfrom it. In fact, when they aren’t playing, or when they are about toface weak opposition like Holland on Thursday, they are being encouragedto let their hair down.Australia’s team hotel in Potchefstroom the last two days has beennoticeable for how many players have been absent.A large gang went to R&R heaven: Sun City. Others went back to thecapital, Johannesburg.Those who did stay in Potchefstroom did laps of the local golf course,swam, played table tennis, played pool, sipped the odd beer – anythingthat didn’t involve cricket, anything that would help clear their heads.It’s all part of a plan to keep the players fresh over a long two-monthtournament, enabling them them to peak at the right times. There’s noneed to be peaking now.The time will come soon enough when the Super Sixes, the semi-final andfinal roll around. There’s an energetic vibe in the camp that wasmissing at the same stage of the Cup four years ago.”I remember us having a very, very tough and hard meeting a couple ofgames in,” said Ponting.”We sat down in Headingley and locked all the doors and just tried toreally get to the bottom of why things were not happening for us.”It was a really open and honest meeting for us, we got everything outbut we haven’t had to do too much of that this time.”Things are going really well and I probably think part of that is thechance we’ve had to – not do our own thing all the time – but we haven’tplaced too much emphasis on this being a big tournament and a World Cup.”We’ve tried to make it a little bit the other way if anything, be alittle bit more low key and just go about our business day in and dayout. The guys are probably responding pretty well to that.”It was built up big-time in ’99 and that’s what we’ve tried to stayaway from. There’s going to be enough excitement and pressure around ongame day anyway to get the guys pumped up, so we’ve deliberately triedto make it as low key as we can.”Australia returned to the nets on the eve of the Holland game withbatteries fully charged.