\u201cWe obviously know a bit about Usama, firstly as a great human being, but also an absolute master at his craft as a leg spinner who can spin it both ways and a bit of a lower order hitter at the bottom for us.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAlthough I\u00a0don\u2019t\u00a0know Sikandar personally, he is good friends with Usama, and his credentials speak for themself really.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u00a0is someone who is\u00a0always in the game and always wants those pressure moments, and that is exactly what you want in T20 cricket.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cFor the boys to be sharing the dressing room with guys of that calibre, and for myself to be around them, is very valuable.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Before a ball has been bowled, the pre-tournament chatter surrounds the favourites, the ones to watch, the wildcard picks and the hotly\u00a0anticipated\u00a0derby day clashes. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
Despite his obvious desire to lift the trophy at Finals Day on the 18th of July, for Worcestershire\u2019s talisman, it is imperative to keep both feet on the ground and cross each bridge as it comes, starting with Friday\u2019s assignment at Leicestershire. \u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have played at that ground quite a bit, so we know what to expect in that sense,\u00a0but ultimately, we\u00a0have to\u00a0play what is in front of us. We go there with plenty of confidence and hope to get a win to start the campaign.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cBut if that\u00a0isn\u2019t\u00a0the case, we\u00a0can\u2019t\u00a0wait to get back here and play in front of a home crowd. They are like a 12th man to us, and we\u00a0can\u2019t\u00a0wait to put on a show for them.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a player, you always look to those big dates in the calendar, and normally it is the first match and then the Bears game, which is always a pretty tantalising prospect and a great spectacle to be involved in.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cYou always want to be challenging for those big trophies and competing, but if you look too far ahead, you lose track of where your feet are in the present, and you will come unstuck.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is all eyes on Friday and performing, we won\u2019t be looking any further ahead than that really.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cWe obviously know a bit about Usama, firstly as a great human being, but also an absolute master…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":596847,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[1721,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-596846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cricket","tag-cricket","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=596846"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596846\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/596847"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=596846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=596846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=596846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}