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Zimbabwe confident to beat New Zealand

By Zahid Newaz in Dhaka
19 October 1998



Zimbabwe, with high morale after beating India in a one off test, is confident of making the final eight of Wills International Cup by defeating New Zealand in the lone pre-quarter final.

``All the players are highly confident to beat New Zealand following our last 18 months' good performance and recent win against India,'' said Zimbabwean skipper and hard-hitting batsman Alistair Campbell.

``We consider ourselves still in the bottom in the cricketing world, but we have the ability to do better as we defeated Pakistan and India in last one and a half years,'' he told a press conference on Sunday.

Campbell said New Zealand is also a good one-day side and they have some good one-day specialists like Chris Harris. Zimbabwe takes on New Zealand on October 24 in the inaugural match of the Wills Cup.

``We are balanced in all departments of one-day cricket and our fielding is specially better,'' Campbell said.

The Zimbabwean skipper said they have good batting line-up including the Flower brothers, Murray Goodwin and also bowling side with world class fast bowler Heath Streak and leg spinner Paul Strang.

Campbell, who is known as ``kamba'' among his teammates, said Dhaka is not a new venue to them as they had been here in 1993. ``We also had lot of cricket in the sub-continent. So we are aware of condition of cricket in this part.''

Asked about favourites for the Wills Cup, Campbell said every team is favourite as all the nine test-playing countries are taking part in the knock-out basis tournament which is a one-chance and lucky game. ``However, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and India are promising for the tournament as they are of the sub-continent and all of them are giants for world cricket,'' said Campbell who began his international career in February 1992.

He described Bangladesh crowd as ``very good, cheerful, patient and sympathetic'' and said, ``We're glad to be here for developing cricket across the world under the auspices of International Cricket Council.

Echoing captain Campbell's statement, Zimbabwean manager Babu Meman said: We are a good side. Our spirit is very high after the sweet test win against India and not bad performance in one-day series also.

The Zimbabwe squad:

Alistair Campbell (capt), Andy Flower, Gavin Rennie, Grant Flower, Craig Wishart, Murray Goodwin, Craig Evans, Paul Strang, Heath Streak, Neil Johnson, Mpumelelo Mbangwa, Andrew Whittall, Henry Olonga, Adam Huckle.


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