South African pacer Anrich Nortje spoke to Channel Seven before the start of the match…
Q: I’m only interested in knowing where you get your pace from. What makes you bowl as fast as you can?
A: For me in general I would say a lot going on, the lead up is a big key in that, trying to get the speed right with the lead up pace. The fold is where most of it happens. The biggest change was front leg to front leg, working on that, getting stronger, the timing of the shoulder and the hips. It helped me raise it within a season and build it from there. Trying to get better and better day by day.
Q: What season did you make the change to?
A: 2017 or 2018.
Q: What prompted that change? Anyone you worked with in particular noticed that?
A: It has always been in the chat. I worked with our coach at home and always had the
but I was afraid of it, I had an injury at school where I landed with my leg straight once, I thought I would never brace myself. From there slowly but surely. During the winter we said walk it through, walk it through slowly, lasted two or three months and then went out and
ate it. It was a bit of a long process, but not too long for the result.
Q: How satisfied were you with Steve Smith’s wicket?
A: I was very happy with the wicket. Overall, we needed a breakthrough to get him out at that stage. The wicket itself, great for bowling. It’s about being consistent and finding it hard during stages, the jumps, landings, maybe energy too. We just had to find a way to go through it and get over that hurdle. Most of us went through that period which wasn’t great, too many runs for a short period, once we pulled out we got better. That’s what I need to focus on this morning.
Q: Travis Head is out there. Not too many short balls against him yesterday, could that be a tactic you could turn to?
A: It’s always an option. For me yesterday when I was bowling against him I got a few to keep low, then one or two nicks, one I thought was very close to Dean (Elgar). All in all, at that stage I felt it was probably the best plan to get him out that way, but maybe we’re going for short balls today. We’ll have to see.