Coach Pubudu Dassanayake hopes for change of fortunes as Canada takes on Namibia in bid to keep ICC Intercontinental Cup hopes alive

Canada coach Pubudu Dassanayake hopes recent disappointments will help his team come back stronger against Namibia in the ICC Intercontinental Cup match starting at Wanderers Cricket Club in Windhoek, Namibia from Thursday.

Canada had arrived on the Africa safari after comprehensively defeating United Arab Emirates (UAE) in the four-day format in July. However, everything fell apart in the middle of this month when it suffered three successive defeats against Kenya in Nairobi, including in the ICC Intercontinental Cup (by nine wickets) and two ODIs (by four wickets on each occasion).

The defeat in the ICC Intercontinental Cup match not only dented its hopes of a repeat of last event's performance (when it reached the final) but also left it short of confidence.

The process of rebuilding confidence began on Tuesday when Canada beat Namibia A by six wickets in a warm-up game, but now comes the side's next test.

After three matches, Canada currently shares third place with Scotland on 26 points as the Netherlands leads the field with 34 points, followed by reigning champion Ireland on 29 points but from one less game. Kenya has 20 points from its only match in the eight-team competition.

And with just three matches remaining against defending champions Ireland and Scotland, as well as Bermuda after the game against Namibia, Canada needs to find its lost form and wrap up its Africa tour on a winning note which will put it back in the race for the final.

"Obviously, it is difficult to go into any match after a series of disappointing results. But the positive side is that in the two ODIs against Kenya we were extremely competitive and gave our much more experienced and fancied opponents a run for their money," said Dassanayake, who played 11 Tests and 16 ODIs for Sri Lanka.

"A coach always looks at the positives and I believe defeats in the last two ODIs were mainly because Kenya utilized its experience and finished off in style even though we controlled the matches for most of the time.

"We have to carry forward that aggressive and positive attitude but with a controlled approach in the Namibian game," said Dassanayake who took over as Canada's permanent coach this month after working as interim coach for almost five months.

Dassanayake, who also represented Canada in 2005 and 2006, said his team will be targeting maximum points. "If we manage to collect 20 points from the Namibian game, we will be in a good position when we play Ireland and Scotland because for those matches we will have the experienced hands of Ashish Bagai and Geoff Barnett who are not on tour because of work commitments."

When the two teams last met in the ICC Trophy 2005 (the qualifying tournament for ICC Cricket World Cup 2007 in the West Indies), Dassanayake kept wicket for Canada and saw his team pull of a thrilling two-run victory in Belfast, Ireland. "The Namibian team has changed quite a lot since that game. The present team has several new youngsters who play their domestic cricket in South Africa.

"It becomes difficult to chalk out a strategy against an unknown opponent but here we want to play to our strength which is batting and fast bowling," he said.

Canada's stand-in captain Sunil Dhaniram is having an excellent ICC Intercontinental Cup and is the leading run-getter with 357 runs from three matches. Trevin Bastiampillai (180), Qiaser Ali (150) and Ashif Mulla (116) are the other main scorers.

Paceman Henry Osinde is successfully spearheading Canada's bowling attack and with 11 wickets, he is the third leading wicket-taker behind the Netherlands' Manish Panchal (13) and team-mate Steven Welsh who, in his only appearance against the UAE, took 12 wickets.

Namibia participates in the SAA Provincial three-day Challenge and last week played its opening game in the competition against North West which ended in a high scoring draw. Gerrie Synman was the star performer for Namibia, scoring 90 in the first innings that helped Namibia secure a three-run first innings lead.

Namibia enters the ICC Intercontinental Cup with high expectations after its U/19 team qualified for next year's ICC U/19 Cricket World Cup from the Africa Region. Three members of that successful campaign - Morne Engelbrecht, Ewald Steenkamp and Raymond van Schoor - have been named in the 13-man squad and are likely to make their first-class debuts against Canada.

Namibia captain Bjorn Kotze admits the performance of the U/19 team has raised the bar of expectations on the senior team. "There is no doubt that the U/19 team has shown us the way forward and has given us extra motivation to match their achievement by winning the ICC Trophy in Abu Dhabi in 2009 to qualify for the ICC Cricket World Cup 2011 in the subcontinent.

"This is a very important phase in Namibian cricket where good youngsters are coming up and pushing the senior players for places in the team. There is pressure on senior players but it is healthy pressure which is getting the best out of us," said the 29-year-old fast bowler took the wickets of Australia's Damien Martyn and the Pakistan duo of Saeed Anwar and Mohammad Yousuf in the ICC Cricket World Cup 2003 in South Africa.

29-year-old Kotze said his team will go in the match with all guns blazing but he is wary of a Canadian backlash. "We feel very confident ahead of the match and want to make a winning start. Although we are missing a few experienced players, we had good run-up to this match and now it's all about delivering at the right time.

"Canada is competitive and a hard team to beat. We are not reading much into their defeats against Kenya because Kenya has far more experience than us. In fact, I think Canada will be more dangerous than before as it will be looking to reverse the fortunes.

"Instead of looking at what they have done in the past, we will concentrate on what we have to do in the coming days to collect maximum points."

Kotze admitted that Wanderers Cricket Ground was a familiar territory for his boys which gave Namibia a slight advantage. "Obviously, you can always prepare better if you are playing in familiar conditions."

The umpires for the match will be Russell Tiffin from Zimbabwe and Brian Jerling from South Africa. Both are from the Emirates International Panel of Umpires.

Canada squad: Sunil Dhaniram (captain), Henry Osinde, Umar Bhatti, Arvind Kandappah, Calvert Hooper, Aftab Shamshudeen, Durand Soraine, Qaiser Ali, Abdul Jabbar Chaudrey, Krunalbhai Patel, Jason Patraj, Trevin Bastiampillai, Ashraf Mulla, Mohamad Iqbal.

Namibia squad: Bjorn Kotze (captain), Andries Burger, Nicolaas Scholtz, Gerrie Snyman, Kola Burger, Matheus van Zyl, Tobias Verwey, Morne Engelbrecht, Louis Klazinga, Ewald Steenkamp, Raymond van Schoor, Michel Durant, Wilber Slabber.

Umpires: Russell Tiffin and Brian Jerling (both Emirates International Panel of Umpires)

The ICC Intercontinental Cup has quickly grown in stature and profile since its inception three years ago and now ICC's premier first-class tournament is an integral part of the Associate Members' cricket schedule.

Having previously been designed around a two-group, three-day format, the event has evolved into an eight-team, round-robin and truly global tournament featuring four-day cricket which gives those teams who do not play Test cricket the chance to experience the longer form of the game.

Scotland won the first ICC Intercontinental Cup in 2004, beating Canada in the final, while Ireland has been victorious in both events since then, beating Kenya in the 2005 decider and Canada earlier this year in the 2006/07 event.

The final of the ICC Intercontinental Cup 2007/08 will take place in November 2008 at a venue yet to be decided.