Australia plans go back 18 months ahead of ICC U/19 Cricket World Cup

Australia coach Brian McFadyen has admitted his side has been planning for this ICC U/19 Cricket World Cup (ICC U/19 CWC) for the past 18 months.

The 1988 and 2002 Champions were humiliated at the last tournament in Bangladesh when they failed to qualify for the Super League stages and then lost in the final of the Plate competition to the hosts.

And McFadyen told reporters in Colombo on Tuesday that those failures had helped focus minds and spark preparations for this tournament, which starts on Sunday.

"Those performances in 2004 gave everyone in Australia a bit of a shake-up," he said.

"Since then we have had four training camps over an 18 month period plus a tour to India and we have been very thorough in our preparations."

A large part of those preparations has been about ensuring the batsmen are able to cope with slow surfaces that are expected to assist the spinners, conditions that few if any of the squad will have encountered back home.

"We have focussed pretty heavily on playing against spin bowling and using different strategies than we would back in Australia," said McFadyen.

"During our training sessions we utilised some Australian players who have had success on the sub-continent.

"We looked to use their expertise and use them to develop different activities and drills for our players.

"And we had a tour of India (in September 2005) that was fantastic for all the players."

Australia lost 4-1 in a five-match ODI series on that trip but captain Moises Henriques said: "We had a lot of players who had not even played international cricket before and they had to learn completely new techniques.

"Batting in India is completely different to batting in Australia and for us to see how the Indians played in those conditions was a great learning curve.

"The conditions, the pitches and the weather were all an experience and it was a good tour."

McFadyen added experience was not the only thing that came from the trip.

"We also established India is going to be very hard to beat," he said. "We realise it is going to take some fantastic cricket to compete with them and also Pakistan and Bangladesh, who I think have a very good side as well."

Henriques is the one survivor of the squad that came unstuck in the previous ICC U/19 CWC in Bangladesh two years ago and he is one of a battery of seam bowlers in the squad.

And he said he had used his experience of that 2004 tournament, together with the trip to India, to formulate a pace bowling plan for the slow pitches he expects to find in Sri Lanka.

"Depending on how the fast bowlers are doing I think we will look to use them in shorter spells than normal," said Henriques.

"Also I think it is a case of looking to bowl within yourself as anyone who tries to huff and puff opponents out on these surfaces might find themselves ending up the worse for wear.

"It may be a case of the odd effort ball every now and then and also we have to look to bowl as straight as possible, especially to players from countries like Sri Lanka and India, as you just cannot give them any width."

Australia find themselves in what could be a real cut-throat group which also includes the West Indies and South Africa, as well as tournament newcomers the United States of America (USA).

With only two sides able to qualify out of each group for the Super League then at least one of those big-name line-ups is going to be mightily disappointed after the first week of matches but Henriques said the pressure that created was not something he and his players were focussing on.

"We are not too worried about that," he commented. "We are just worried about playing good cricket.

"If we do that then we will certainly get to the final stages of the World Cup. We are worried about what we have got to do and not who we are playing against or who is in our group."

And although the captain did not use a word like revenge, it is clear he wants to set the record straight after what happened in 2004.

"I think all the boys are hungry to make amends for that and I think we have got the side to do it," said Henriques.

Australia's Group B matches are against South Africa (February 5), the West Indies (February 8) and the USA (February 9).

The top two sides from each of the four groups in the tournament will progress to the Super League stage, which consists of knock-out quarter- and semi-finals and a final on 19 February.

The Australia squad is: Moises Henriques (Captain), Aaron Finch (Vice-captain), Jackson Bird, Tom Cooper, Ben Cutting, Jon Holland, Simon Keen, Usman Khawaja, Jack McNamara, Adam Ritchard, William Sheridan, Tom Stray, Matthew Wade and David Warner.

Manager - Geoff Tamblyn, coach - Brian McFadyen, assistant coach - Matthew Mott, physiotherapist -Max Pfitzner.

The ICC U/19 Cricket World Cup 2006 will take place between February 5 and 19. 16 teams are scheduled to play 44 matches in 15 days at five different venues in Colombo.