Cats coach urges calm as pressure intensifies

BROADBEACH Robina captain Sean Fitzsimmons insists his side’s one-day dominance over Helensvale Pacific Pines will count for nothing when the sides meet in the Kookaburra Cup semi final.

While Helensvale prevailed in their lone Twenty20 battle in November, the Cats will enter today’s do-or-die 40-over clash on the back of dominant one-day wins over the Hawks in December and March.

On both occasions Broadbeach’s bowlers did the damage, first dismissing the Hawks for 130 before skittling them for 113 second time around.

However, Fitzsimmons, 39, is refusing to get carried away as his side chases its first premiership since 2012-13.

“Anything can happen in finals. Obviously their top order is their strength … and we’ve been able to nullify that a little bit (but) we’ve just got to worry about our own game,” the Queensland Country rep said.

“I know Helensvale has been a surprise packet but we’ve got lots of juniors in our team so we’re a bit surprised. We’ve played six or seven under-17 players and three or four of them have ended up as mainstays.

“We’ve been pretty strong over the past five, six, seven seasons so everyone thinks we should be there (in finals) but we didn’t think we would be.”

Having claimed hosting rights for today’s battle after finishing the season in second, Fitzsimmons said he would tell his young charges to stick with a simple finals formula.

“It’s not about (focusing on) how many runs you get or wickets you take. It’s about bowling one side of the wicket, getting yourself in, rotating the strike and all those basic things.”