New Zealand's senior pro Ross Taylor speaks to mid-day about how people back home reacted to their heartbreaking World Cup final loss to England
NZ's Ross Taylor walks back after being dismissed for 15 during WC final v England at Lord's last month
On July 14, the cricketing world witnessed its greatest ODI match ever when England edged out New Zealand on boundary count to lift their maiden World Cup trophy at Lord's.
With the match and the Super Over both ending in a tie, it was a rare occurrence in cricket's history to see a scoreline of 26-17 go in favour of England.
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A month after that epic final, the New Zealand players will take the field against Sri Lanka in the first Test on August 14 at Galle with the heartbreak and emotions still fresh in their minds.
Ahead of New Zealand's clash v Sri Lanka which will be beamed live on the Sony ESPN channels, Ross Taylor spoke to mid-day about the overwhelming response the New Zealanders received after the World Cup final, the messages from the Indian team whom they knocked out in the semi-final and how they are trying to recover from their biggest heartbreak.
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Excerpts:
New Zealand will be back in the park in Sri Lanka after that epic World Cup final. What are your plans from the series and have you and the boys recovered from the heartbreak?
We are definitely going to play quite differently as a team and to recover, we have the support staff, family and friends, who are there with us. As you play, you go through a lot of ups and downs. You learn to deal with failure and losing. Yet, probably it's just best that you learn to deal with failure. And I guess it's not something new in these kind of championships…it's cricket again. We almost had the World Cup, but then we are again bringing in the energy and probably will bring out the best of this New Zealand team.
The entire cricketing world rallied around your team after the final...
It was a fantastic campaign. After we were beaten, we received various messages from the Indian team and at that point of time I knew we had their support. And synonymous to the world's population, the cricket followers were out there supporting us, which was a nice feeling.
Can you share a touching message you received?
When I went to home, I remember my son's teacher said that it was a heart-breaking moment for her and her husband. And during the final over and not even the Super Over, her husband was biting on his nail so hard, that he chipped off his tooth. So everyone had their own story and probably the lack of sleep was the common thing between all of us.
How difficult is it to accept that New Zealand lost on a boundary count?
Obviously, we are quite disappointed with the final result but if you look at the whole success, it was a great campaign. Not a lot of people thought we would get as far as we did. The way the team played, especially in the semi-final and the final... the way they played for each other, was quite commendable. I guess that's the thing about being a cricketer — there are lots of ups and downs. But then, you have to move on quickly.
Moving on from Lord's, what does the future hold for you as far as playing for New Zealand is concerned?
We have always looked forward, counting on from the 2015 World Cup to the 2019 World Cup. Obviously, there are a lot of big games to play that are coming up, about 100 Test matches, ICC T20 World Cup in Australia. [So], there are a lot of big games to try to hang around for and keep the flow. This would help to take the fear off and just play again after years in the series.
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