Playing my first World Cup

It is now one day till our first match and I have mixed feelings of anxiety, nerves and excitement ahead of our opening game.

It is an amazing feeling to be part of the women’s World Cup, the biggest event in women’s cricket, and to play in my first major international tournament.

Preparations have gone well, with some improved showings against Bangladesh during the triangular series last month, although once again we didn’t score enough runs with the bat. However, the warm-up matches have been much more encouraging with some good totals against New Zealand and South Africa and we know we will need to maintain and improve that standard if we are going to have a chance in this competition.

It is great to be in Sydney and fantastic to have the support of my parents with me, who have both flown out from Karachi for the tournament. We will at least have some support here as some of the other players in our squad have siblings who live in Australia as well.

I have really liked what I have seen of the city and have been lucky enough to go to two welcome functions which have both provided spectacular views of the harbour area.

I would really love to go on a fishing trip if there was time but the thing I most want to do while I am here is to attempt the Sydney Harbour Bridge climb as I have heard that it is an amazing feeling when you get to the top. Maybe if I do the climb I will be able to be given the day off training!

It has been great to be staying in the same hotel as all of the teams and meet some of the greatest players in the women’s game. It is like a dream to be able to talk to the sport’s biggest names and find out how they prepare for matches.

I was honoured to sit next to Charlotte Edwards at dinner on Wednesday night who I believe has done a lot for the women’s game.

She mentioned it will be her fourth World Cup – obviously this is my first event – and I appreciate the dedication it has taken to help her become one of the world’s greatest players. India will be a very tough challenge on the opening day of the event, but we have targeted the Sri Lankan game as one we certainly are capable of winning.

Having played them so many times we know what the strengths and weaknesses of the Sri Lankan team are and we believe we are at the same level as them – we just need to make sure we adapt well to pressurised situations as I know we are capable of defeating them.

We are obviously all very sad about what has happened back at home this week and our sympathies go out to the Sri Lankan men’s cricket team and everybody affected by what happened, but we have to keep our focus on playing cricket and doing the best we can at the World Cup.