JOHANNESBURG - Stephen Fleming is well used to the pre-match media conference rigmarole, but even he was goggle-eyed at the turnout for his solo show yesterday.
The New Zealand captain entered the stuffy conference room at Supersport Park in Centurion, a few hours from the clash with India, to the glare
of 10 television cameras and between 60 and 80 media representatives.
It was standing-room only for the Fleming sermon, a turnout befitting royalty or rock stars.
Fleming may have experienced such a scrum before on tours of India, but the massive interest far outweighed anything he had seen at the World Cup to date.
The previous day, Chris Cairns had to fight off a ruck of 25 Indian journalists, all competing intensely to bark the same questions.
As usual, Fleming put on a polished show yesterday as he glanced off questions with a sternly raised eyebrow or a fair degree of quick wit.
The first tricky moment came when he was asked an identical question to the one he had just answered from the other side of the room.
"At the risk of repeating myself ... ," he began with a deadpan look.
He took umbrage at a poser about the lack of big scores from the top-order batsmen and was quick to put the questioner right, having cracked a memorable 134 not out himself against South Africa.
"I wouldn't say that - there's been some pretty good hundreds scored ... "
Then to the inevitable question about Kenya, and how the forfeiting of competition points for their refusal to travel to Nairobi was still affecting New Zealand.
"I'm sorry, I turned off after you mentioned Kenya. What was the last bit?"
Fleming even resorted to a joke at the expense of his chairman of selectors, Sir Richard Hadlee, when he was asked what was being said when the pair met for a prolonged chat at training.
"He was talking about his 430-odd test wickets, as he always does," Fleming said with a grin, the room erupting with laughter.
But the real star of the day was India captain Sourav Ganguly, the man whose word everyone seemed to hang on, and who swelled the numbers from Fleming's gathering by an extra 20 to almost 100.
Ganguly was having nothing of the match being talked up as revenge for the hammering his side received in New Zealand in the New Year.
His confident air was a far cry from the meek mindset he showed in New Zealand, when he could not buy a run and was under pressure to retain his job.
- NZPA
World Cup schedule
Points table
JOHANNESBURG - Stephen Fleming is well used to the pre-match media conference rigmarole, but even he was goggle-eyed at the turnout for his solo show yesterday.
The New Zealand captain entered the stuffy conference room at Supersport Park in Centurion, a few hours from the clash with India, to the glare
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