Nepal players need to be put under pressure for performance: Coach Nick

Nepal coach Nick Pothas believes the country’s players need to be put under more pressure going forward for tangible improvements and urged them to avoid repeating mistakes from the last two matches when they play their final T20 World Cup game against Scotland in Mumbai on Tuesday. Nepal made a sparkling start to their T20 World Cup campaign with a last-ball finish in a narrow loss to England, but their performances have nosedived since, losing heavily to Italy and the West Indies by 10 and nine wickets respectively.

“If we’re going to improve Nepal cricket, we need to have an infrastructure below. Teams only get better when there’s pressure on players to perform. I’m not sure what there exists in Nepal, but players need to feel like they’re under pressure to perform in order for your cricket to improve,” Pothas told reporters ahead of the Group C match. Pothas said there is lot of skill in the dressing room but the pace of learning is not as fast it should be.

“Unfortunately, what we aren’t doing is we’re not learning fast enough as a group. Leading into the Scotland game, all we want to see guys do is compete, but not make the same errors we’re making repeatedly. That’s the important part. “We’re a very energetic side, a very passionate side with a great following that have come to watch us play so we’d like to give that following something to remember this World Cup by,” Pothas added.

The former South African wicketkeeper-batter said exposure to conditions and situations outside their comfort zone has also affected Nepal’s performances. “We’re expecting the players to learn quicker, (but) now what makes that a little bit more difficult is exposure to various conditions and exposure to high-level cricket,” he said.

“For these players, a lot of their cricket is played in Nepal where the wickets suit their style of play and you can get away with not executing quite as much because of the standard of the cricket. When you come to a World Cup, you don’t get away with that kind of thing.” Pothas admitted Nepal will need a more robust structure in domestic cricket in order to make the national side stronger.

“That’s a conversation to be had with (Cricket Association of Nepal’s secretary) Paras (Khadka) as to how we structure the side,” he said. “One thing I will say is that I’ve been on three different assignments with Nepal and in every one of those assignments, we’ve had two managers in the change room and they’ve been different managers.”