Former Australian opener Geoff Marsh, who has been a World Cup winner both as a player and a coach, has been called into Australia's camp to advise the squad on handling the expectations that comes with hosting the tournament and believes that they can handle the pressure.
Geoff, who is the father of squad member Mitchell Marsh, joined the Australians in camp in Perth before Sunday's tri-series final against England. He assisted with training and was also asked to speak to the team about the last World Cup there in 1992, when Australia bombed out before the knockout stage.
Geoff, who had been a hero of Australia's first World Cup win in 1987, was in the side five years later that dropped out at the group stage and believes that there are lessons that can be learnt from what went wrong 23 years ago, Sydney Morning Herald reported.
Geoff said that they would just basically talk about 1992 and where they were at, and their preparation and things to be guided by.
Geoff claimed that there hasn't been a home World Cup since, adding that it's great to play a World Cup at home but the expectation is really high. He recalled it being tough for Allan Border's team in 1992 to combat the pressures of being hosts as well as defending champions.
Geoff believes that Australia is well placed to join India, who has been the only team to win the World Cup on home soil in 2011, in that category and win a fifth title as long as they do not allow the inevitable expectations to affect them.
The former opener said that if one puts themselves in that position where there is pressure then it can have an impact, but added that this team's planning has been in place for a very long time; they've done a lot of homework and when one knows that, one goes into a tournament feeling really good about themselves and he believes that the current Australian squad is.
Geoff believes that they were just caught out a little bit in 1992, adding that they went to New Zealand and they'd done very well in their planning against Australia and won that game, and then they played South Africa in the second game and they'd just come back into world cricket and they were hungry.
He added that they really put the pressure on and he believes that Australia felt that, adding that they just couldn't get back into the tournament after that.
But, Geoff claimed that it's great playing in Australia because one knows the conditions and one should be favoured by those conditions, but one has got to make it work.
