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Regis Chakabva

Eddie Chikamhi Sports Reporter
WICKET-KEEPER Regis Chakabva says Zimbabwe need the right mentality and to guard against complacency against the Associate nations if they hope to achieve their goals at the ICC World Cup 2015 which gets underway in New Zealand and Australia later this month.

Zimbabwe have set themselves a quarter-final target but they would need to win at least three group games to secure their place in the Super Eight.

The Chevrons are in Group B where they face pre-tournament favourites South Africa, defending champions India, Pakistan, West Indies and minnows Ireland and United Arab Emirates.

They are expected to win both games against Ireland and United Arab Emirates and then aim for an upset against one of the four big teams to achieve their dream.

However, Chakabva believes the team needs the right mentality to avoid disappointment.

“Cricket is quite a funny game. Obviously we are expected to beat the minnows and then get one or two wins against the big teams so that we get to the Super Eight. But we can’t relax even when playing the minnows because they are still good sides.

“At the World Cup, no one is really a minnow. There have been some shockers in previous tournaments. So we will obviously be looking to do the same to the big teams while we also aim to play our best cricket against the smaller teams.

“Every game is important. If you carry the mentality that there are games that are less important than others then you will defeat yourself in the process. We have our targets and we need to make sure that we are on point every game and try and win.”

Zimbabwe arrived in New Zealand on Friday where they have set base in the city of Gisborne. The Chevrons are expected to play New Zealand’s Northern Region XI today in their first practice match.

The Northern Districts XI side will feature players from the Northern Knights, which is one of New Zealand’s First-class teams.

The matches were organised by Zimbabwe Cricket to give the team as much time in the middle as possible and in conditions similar to what they will encounter during the ICC Cricket World Cup.

They have two more practice matches on Wednesday and Friday before engaging New Zealand and Sri Lanka in high profile warm-up games arranged by the ICC. Zimbabwe will play their opening pool matches against South Africa and United Arab Emirates in New Zealand on February 15 and 19 before moving base to Australia for the next three games. They will come back to New Zealand for the last game against India.

Chakabva said their camp in New Zealand will help the team acclimatise to the conditions before their opening match against South Africa in less than two weeks.

“We are looking forward to a few warm up games in New Zealand that will definitely give us much needed preparation as well as getting used to the conditions a bit more. Otherwise we have prepared the best we can, given the time frame we had.

“We would like to go as far as we can at the tournament but without getting too ahead of ourselves we want to make the Super Eight, to start with, and then take it from there,” said Chakabva.

Zim World Cup fixtures:

Sunday 15 February

Zim v South Africa (Seddon Park, Hamilton, New Zealand)

Thursday 19 February

Zim v UAE (Saxton Oval, Nelson, New Zealand)

Tuesday 24 February

Zim v West Indies (Manuka Oval, Canberra, Australia)

Sunday 01 March

Zim v Pakistan (The Gabba, Brisbane, Australia)

Saturday 07 March

Zim v Ireland (Bellerive Oval, Hobart, Australia)

Saturday 14 March

Zim v India (Eden Park, Auckland, New Zealand)