Not taking Nepal lightly: Kagiso Rabada expects South Africa to play better cricket

Welcome to Saint Vincent. Good to have you here. South Africa through to Super Eights. It's been a good tournament. Of course, some like two really close wins. So what all to look forward to in the game against Nepal? Yeah, it's another, it's another international match, another fixture and we're not taking them lightly and we're going to try and play some more of the same cricket or even better that we've been playing in the tournament. What you've made out of the wicket so far, a bit of a challenge. The Ballers are back into the game it seems. Enjoying that the fact that the Ballers have held the upper hand so far in the tournament as a bowler, I must say. Yeah, I have enjoyed it 100%. But conditions will probably level out now. The Caribbean experience. You've played cricket here before. What do you think about like how different would it be potentially to USA And also the fact that we saw the home team getting incredible support the other night in Trinidad. What kind of support do you expect? We saw the end of game earlier today, both Netherlands and Bangladesh having good support. So looking forward to starting the the Caribbean leg. Yeah, 100%. I don't know how many South African fans are in Saint Vincent, but however maybe they're like like 10 of them. However many of them they are, hopefully they rock up but I'm not expecting a whole lot of support. Perhaps maybe the some of the locals support South Africa so hopefully they can turn out numbers. It's the dream for that elusive trophy. Of course now getting stronger and we've seen South Africa. You also made it to the semi finals in the 50 World Cup. This team looks incredibly strong and has been doing really well. How is it going? Is it day by day or you perhaps it's a target considering the history, not too much in focus to perhaps to like focus on a game at a time. Sadhguru I believe we're going to win it and you just have to take it game by game that you can't look too far ahead. Sadhguru OK, so you played with Sandeep Lamisane back in Delhi Daredevils and he's back in Nepal team. Do you think his inclusion will have any positive effect in Nepal team? And how are you looking forward against the class against Nepal? Sadhguru, Yeah, he's a he's a mystery spinner. So any mystery spinners are going to be tough to play. And but I know that the guys are really looking forward, you know, to facing that challenge in New York, the batters didn't get the chance to open up. But this is a different piece. We've seen the today's match as well. How do you see your middle order stacking up with the experts in the IPL? We've seen them. Do you think this is the right time for them to open up their arms and get some runs in? Actually, I haven't really seen how the Wicked played. I haven't seen the game yet. But according to the Nets, there's going to be some turn and it's going to be a bit slow. But then I'm sure guys are getting to grips with how the Wicked Wicked is playing and already forming game plans as to how they're going to combat. You know, any any, any plans that that are formed against us? Hi Cookie. So congratulations for going into the Super 8 now as a team, when you play like a qualifier like Nepal, now what what basically goes through the mind of a big cricketing nation like South Africa and, and like what, And what's your plan for tomorrow as a, as a cricketing nation? How much South Africa knows about Nepal? To be honest, I, I don't know a fair amount about, you know, how they play. But, you know, we have our analysis and we will do our homework. But I know that they've been really, you know, playing playing more and more over the past number of years. And it's good to see in the game of cricket that that is growing. And yeah, like I said earlier, it's not a game that we're going to take lightly. Not at all. We can't take it lightly. And you talked about about 10 South African fans there. We met around 100 Nepali fans already in Saint Vincent, so you can expect their support as well. Oh OK, so just about the format of the tournament, 20 teams competing. Wow. What's your take on the format? And we've seen some incredible upsets already, so enjoying this again, the gathering of so-called destinations. But they're very much punching above their weight it seems and giving a really tough run to the full members. I think, like I said earlier, cricket is, is growing and not only by the amount of teams that are there, but also with a world event being hosted in, in the well, in America, West Indies. You know, the different countries in the West Indies are not foreign to hosting world events, but especially with the inclusion of the USA and teams like Uganda, teams like Oman who who have come on and and had their chance to shine on the stage shows that cricket's growing. And you look at and you hope that you really hope that the the fan engagement can grow around the world. And you hope that not all all eyes are going to all eyes will be on the biggest teams, but hopefully they can grow too and cricket can be a real real world event. Finally, about your batters, you've had, you've got an incredible batting lineup, some incredibly explosive players who've done really well around the world in various competitions. What's the mood like in the batting camp, especially with the pitches perhaps not being too conducive? Are they getting achieved for the big scores? Do they really want to flex their muscles and hit those big sixes? And any, any suggestions from you to them as to how they can perhaps, you know, go on their business in the upcoming days? You want me to say this in a press conference? I think that the, the guys are really keen for the challenge. And with us, it's just about winning, whether we, we score 96 and win or whether we score 296 and win. At the end of the day, it's about the West. And that's what we've done so far. But I, we, we do expect, I do expect that conditions are going to level up because you had the drop in pitches in the USA, you never really know how they're going to play, you know, and we had an idea of how well, a full idea of how they play. And now you've, you've actually got squares that have been there for years, you know, here in these, in these venues. And you'll probably see more competitive scores. And you look at the game between Australia and, and England where 200 played, you know, 150. So if, if you do bat well in these conditions, you can still reach 200. But you, you want, you want to, you want to get a game and find pictures where you have enough in it for the bowlers and enough in it for the batters, because that's essentially what a cricket game is. Otherwise you might as well just call it batting or you might as well call it bowling. But you know, the, the guys, you, you, you can't really judge their form on, on wickets. You know that we've, we've just played on. It's, you know, as much as it's, it's not an excuse, but you know, the common sense would prevail And you would say that it's, you know, you can't really blame the batters. But in saying that, no one's, no one's got any demons. Everyone's moving forward. We play the conditions as we see them and on our day we know, you know, the Sky's the limit in terms of batting. Thank you very much, Rezo and Lucy, and all the very best for the game. Thank you. Thanks.