David Warner has laughed off talk about poor form and feels that he is close to finding his best touch, having substituted the practice nets in the UAE for synthetic and concrete surfaces.
Warner, who has played five innings in all cricket since April with scores of 0, 2, 0, 1 and 14, revealed the training tactic – something he has previously used at home – was an attempt to overcome nets training which are showing the negative effects of a lot of traffic over the last few months and, he believes, risk bringing bad habits into his batting.
Overcoming bad habits in nets, going back to the basics
“One thing that should be noted is these practice wickets have been up for close to 12 weeks now, so training is quite difficult on them as well,” Warner said. “At the moment I’m training on some synthetic wickets and polished concrete to get timing and rhythm and moving my feet so that’s helping me.
“When you are practicing on low wickets that aren’t great it gets you into sticky positions in the games when you are on better wickets. You have to get your brain working again with your feet and hands to get into good positions.
“You want to feel bat on ball, but it also makes you move your feet more. We are so used to the ball coming onto the bat and when you do that and are moving, you start dancing in the game. If you are practicing bad habits at training because you aren’t able to get that volume in, you have to go back to the basics.”
People talking about my form is funny, I laugh at them
Warner spoke about his lack of conviction in the stroke that brought his downfall, saying he was too focused on seeing out what was Kagiso Rabada’s third over of his opening spell.
“In hindsight I should have played it over the top, but I pushed it to backward point,” he said. “My feet were moving, I got into great positions, but my awareness should have been to go with it. Felt I was one boundary away from having a good innings
“I actually think people talking about my form is quite funny. I laugh at the matter. I’ve played hardly any cricket. Had two games in the IPL and then warm-up games are warm-up games for a reason. The other day I got my benchmark as where I should be at with my feet.”