England v New Zealand: The best bits of Andy Flower's 'prickly' post-match interview
BBC's Jonathan Agnew described his post-Test interview with Andy Flower as 'prickly'. Here's the best of it...
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Your support makes all the difference.Jonathan Agnew You got there, is it fair to say you did it the hard way?
Andy Flower You'll have to expand on that, Test cricket is a hard game, and taking 20 wickets is difficult, but do you want to expand on your question?
JA You might have enforced the follow-on...
AF We had the right to choose, and we chose to bat again and get well ahead of them, we thought we would have enough time on a wearing pitch to take 10 wickets and that's what we did.
JA What about our second innings? Were you a bit frustrated at the pace of the scoring rate?
AF We could have been more urgent. Trott could have learnt a little from [Root and Bairstow] from the first innings, the right amount of urgency and positivity.
JA Did you bat too long? Do you think you might have declared at lunch-time?
AF We could have declared at any time, that was our right. We chose 20 minutes after lunch and we thought that was enough time and it's nice that that was proved right.
JA You won, Andy. I am not attacking you. I assume that you want to win in the best possible way every game, what might you take away from this game in that regard?
AF What do you mean 'what might we take away from this game in that regard'?
JA Well, do you think that this was a 100 per cent performance?
AF I am sure, Aggers, when you reflect on your broadcasting today that you wouldn't have been 100 per cent, none of us operate at 100 per cent. It was a very good performance from our side: we won by over 200 runs. Cook and Root got tons, Swann is back in form, Finn got bounce. I would prefer to focus on these things than some of the negative things that you mention.
JA You have a break away from the limelight now, the next time we see you will be that series beginning with A – are we allowed to talk about it or not, that A word?
AF Why might you not be able to?
JA I thought we were put off talking about the Ashes…
AF No, I am asking you. Why might we not be able to talk about the Ashes?
JA I don't know, I simply read in the newspaper that it was not a directive, but a preference for the Ashes not to be talked about at the moment?
AF OK, and where would that directive have come from?
JA You, apparently.
AF Well, that is incorrect.
JA OK, see you at the Ashes.
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