Head coach Jonathan Trott on Afghanistan's 107 run loss to South Africa

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Head coach Jonathan Trott on Afghanistan's 107 run loss to South Africa  21/02/2025  icc25

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00:00Not an ideal start for the Champions Trophy.

00:19What went wrong today?

01:49Lahore and Afghanistan known to produce some good results on the spin wickets in Asia.

01:55So looking forward to those two matches after this early setback. Thank you.

02:00Yeah, obviously support is great. I think the guys enjoy support wherever they go, certainly in the UAE or here.

02:07So hopefully we'll get more of that in Lahore and it'll spur the guys on.

02:12Yeah, I think obviously it's pretty clear what we need to do now. We know we didn't play well enough today.

02:16We know we've got to pull our socks up and play a lot better

02:19against England on the 26th and against Australia on the 28th.

02:25Between over number 11 to 40, Afghanistan used to build their running quite well, but today they just scored

02:33161 runs and lost six wickets.

02:34So don't you really think that Afghanistan needs some stability in the middle of a leg, which they do in the World Cup 2023?

02:41So they need that same momentum today because wicket was not offering too much for the bowlers as well.

02:47But they are using short ball again, Afghanistan. So how do you summarize these sort of things?

02:53I think

02:56the Openers need to set up the game as well with the top

02:59three or four batters and I think within their dismissals, there were a few soft dismissals.

03:04I think a lot of dot balls early on. I think the pitch sort of

03:09at this evening sort of aided the South African bowlers and I think they bowled really well and made it quite hard work for us.

03:15But there are a lot of soft dismissals there for me and something I'll be chatting to the batters about and

03:20how to go about it a little bit better perhaps for the rest of the tournament.

03:27Hi Jonathan, going forward, like you know, it's back-to-back games. Any particular area that you would like to address?

03:35All three, bowling, batting and fielding.

03:38Any particular area that you would like to address?

03:50I think we could do better with the new ball, take wickets.

03:53We need to take wickets in the power play, make it easier for our spinners

03:57coming on and bowling at newer batters or batters who aren't set or coming out of the power play.

04:04Fielding, there's a few missed fields

04:06and we need to be a little bit sharper in certain areas. And then today the batting, as I said already, a few soft dismissals

04:12under pressure and things we need to get better and do better

04:17on the 26th.

04:19Hi Jonathan,

04:20this was probably the first time Afghanistan were playing in Karachi.

04:24So you guys have played all around the world in Sharjah and in India,

04:29but like how was it playing over here? There's like a great crowd turned up and it wasn't a Pakistan match.

04:35So how are the players feeling and how are they playing here?

04:38Really good. I think they, you know, as I said, I've been asked the question already, is that they enjoy any support.

04:45You know, whether we're in Sharjah or whether we're in Abu Dhabi.

04:48So to get the sort of home crowd advantage like we did tonight is awesome. And we certainly hope

04:54that that'll be the case in Lahore for both our games.

05:05Hi, do you think Afghanistan have issues in middle order, especially in batting?

05:14Do you think it's need to be solved?

05:18Well, yeah, I think any time you get bowled out for just over 200,

05:23chasing 300, you're going to ask the middle order,

05:26especially when one player gets 90, batting at number four.

05:29You ask, you sometimes look around and if somebody had batted with him

05:33and been able to build a partnership like we've spoken about,

05:37you know, we could have got ourselves close to the title today.

05:40So that's the most disappointing thing is one person showed us exactly how it could be done

05:45and get us close if there had just been a few guys who had had a similar day to him.

05:52So, yeah, it's everyone's responsibility.

05:54Jonathan, nowadays we see a lot of players play franchise cricket together

06:04and then they played against each other.

06:06So what do you say?

06:07This thing is helpful, knowing each other or knowing their strengths and weaknesses,

06:12or you think that this franchise thing has just made things more difficult

06:17for teams playing against each other?

06:20I don't, I'm not quite sure whether it's a pro or a con, really.

06:27But one thing I do think is that there's a lot of,

06:31it's quite difficult to get that rivalry going when last week

06:34some players were playing in the same team together,

06:37or this week they're playing against each other.

06:39So it makes it a little bit confusing thing for some players.

06:43But for me, we've got to make sure that when we play against anyone on the 26th,

06:48it's 11 versus 11, and we're going out there to beat them.

06:52And whereas today, a lot of these players have played together in franchises in the SA20.

07:01And so it's always tricky where the line is between rivalry or friendships on or off the field.

07:08But I think the way that we play the game is the right way.

07:10And we've never, I don't think we've ever really got that fall

07:15on the wrong side of how I think it should be.

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