Goal is to win more matches than last year: Sathish

Speaking to DTNext, Sathish said the team is riding high on confidence. “We are commencing preparations from Sunday. We have been a confident bunch having finished second last season,” he said. 

Emphasising on the fact that the team is keen to work on the finer points in the runup to the league Sathish said, “We have a well-balanced team. We have played good cricket last season. Although a couple of matches did not go our way, we were pretty much consistent throughout the league last year. It is a matter of working on those gaps and we are raring to go.” 

Sathish said the positive factor of going into the league would be that the players wouldn’t be short of match practice. “Many players are in the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association’s league and although the formats are different (three-day format and T20 format) they would have been flexing their muscles which is good. As professional cricketers, I don’t see that the switch to different formats would be tough,” he explained. 

CSG has retained the core of the team and has added two players in R Suthish and S Radhakrishnan strengthening their bowling and batting respectively. “Suthish has been one of the consistent performers in the league and it is good to have a left-arm fast bowler in the team. It is good for the team to have variations and in a left-arm bowler, we can form a good bowling combination. It is however a pity that we won’t have the services of Radhakrishnan who would be away on national duty. He might be available for the knock-outs but its far sighted,” he added. 

Sathish said he is confident of leading his team to glory. “Confidence is my strength. Captaincy isn’t any pressure and I have always been confident leading from the front. The goal we have as a team is to win more matches than last year,” he added.