'Specific place, specific time' - Phillips explains World Cup switch-hit

Two months after his switch-hit in the Super Smash, New Zealand's domestic T20 tournament, had gone viral, Glenn Phillips was confident of bringing that out of his locker in a World Cup game against Canada on a red-soil surface in Chennai. Phillips has said that the asymmetric boundary dimensions at Chepauk on Tuesday influenced his decision to have a crack at the shot.

In the 13th over of New Zealand's chase of 174, Phillips switched from his usual right-handed stance to a left-handed one with left-arm fingerspinner Saad Bin Zafar midway through his run-up. After Saad darted one in on middle stump, Phillips slog-swept it over midwicket to ping the shorter boundary on the leg side (for a left-hander and off side for a right-hander).

"Yeah, it [the switch-hit] is different. It's very much a specific place and time shot," Phillips said at his post-match press conference. "Obviously short side, the leg side, and the reason for switching rather than staying left-handed to start was to hopefully keep that gap out cow corner free.

"So, obviously the opportunity came to use it today and sometimes you've actually still got to bring it out and have the courage to bring it out in a game, which can be sometimes hard. But I guess if you've practiced it you've got to pull it out."

Phillips added that he uses that shot to open up different scoring zones. "For me, it's not supposed to be a one-trick pony option," Phillips said. "The idea is that if the bowler bowls a good ball or he slows it up or bowls it wide or wherever he decides to put it, there's a bail-out option - whether that's hitting it through the leg side for one, or whether he puts it in the slot and I send it out of the ground.

"Being able to have that option to go both sides and understand that it's just not a one-hitting zone shot. So if the pitch is a little bit slower, then it's still watching the ball and playing where it needs to be hit, whether that's down the ground, over the leg side, over the off side."

Phillips has had a good time in India, scoring a brace of crucial 40-plus scores in three innings and helping New Zealand into the Super Eight stage. They will play all their three Super Eight games at the Khettarama in Colombo. A few of New Zealand's players, including Phillips himself, have featured in the Lanka Premier League, but he doesn't see that as a major advantage, suggesting that the pitches there have changed since, favouring more spin than seam, especially in the ongoing T20 World Cup.

"The Lanka League was fast, bouncy, quick and 200 played 200 pretty much every game," Phillips said. "So I think actually the international stuff that we played where we played on trickier wickets was probably a little bit more valuable, but understanding that the outfields are incredibly fast. Sometimes it's pretty tough to catch in the lights out there as well, so to be able to hopefully get a couple of trainings under lights would be fantastic.

"But I guess it's understanding that gaps and hitting the gaps hard, especially with how fast the outfields are over there, with how rock hard the outfield is, that definitely comes into play. And the boys have had a few opportunities over there as well, which is fantastic."