Published on ShanghaiDaily.com (http://www.shanghaidaily.com/)
http://www.shanghaidaily.com/sp/article/2008/200811/20081112/article_380277.htm
Pietersen urges team to raise its standard
Created: 2008-11-12
ENGLAND captain Kevin Pietersen urged his team to raise its standard ahead of the one-day series against India this week after it lost a warm-up match by 124 runs yesterday.
The visitors lost to a second-string Mumbai side after their batsmen collapsed for 98.
"We have learnt a few lessons now today," Pietersen told reporters. "We are back to competitive cricket. We played our last competitive game before the Stanford week, round about the third or fourth of September.
"That was a long time ago. We had a good seven weeks off into that week. And now we are back into the real, real tough stuff to come here to India.
"We are learning to make sure that we get ourselves right and take our lessons to get our heads back on and get them really, really tuned into what's going to be a tough tour starting this evening."
The tourists went into their second warm-up match with only two fit fast bowlers. Stuart Broad withdrew with a sore knee and Ryan Sidebottom has still to recover from an Achilles injury.
Their batsmen against medium-pacer Kshemal Waingankar, who took 5-37.
England, chasing 223 for victory, lost its first six wickets for 38 with Pietersen falling for nought. Allrounder Andrew Flintoff, who scored a century in the first warm-up match, made five.
"The wicket wasn't difficult (to chase). We didn't apply ourselves as we should have," said Pietersen. "I think (there was) just a bit of indiscipline in some of the shots.
"Nobody really remembers what happens in practice games, it's the internationals that count," he added.
England won the first warm-up match on Sunday. The seven-match one-day series starts on Friday with the opening game in Rajkot.
The visitors lost to a second-string Mumbai side after their batsmen collapsed for 98.
"We have learnt a few lessons now today," Pietersen told reporters. "We are back to competitive cricket. We played our last competitive game before the Stanford week, round about the third or fourth of September.
"That was a long time ago. We had a good seven weeks off into that week. And now we are back into the real, real tough stuff to come here to India.
"We are learning to make sure that we get ourselves right and take our lessons to get our heads back on and get them really, really tuned into what's going to be a tough tour starting this evening."
The tourists went into their second warm-up match with only two fit fast bowlers. Stuart Broad withdrew with a sore knee and Ryan Sidebottom has still to recover from an Achilles injury.
Their batsmen against medium-pacer Kshemal Waingankar, who took 5-37.
England, chasing 223 for victory, lost its first six wickets for 38 with Pietersen falling for nought. Allrounder Andrew Flintoff, who scored a century in the first warm-up match, made five.
"The wicket wasn't difficult (to chase). We didn't apply ourselves as we should have," said Pietersen. "I think (there was) just a bit of indiscipline in some of the shots.
"Nobody really remembers what happens in practice games, it's the internationals that count," he added.
England won the first warm-up match on Sunday. The seven-match one-day series starts on Friday with the opening game in Rajkot.
Agencies
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