Carey keen to work with monk-like Langer

T20 cricket

Australia wicketkeeper Alex Carey is keen to get to work with new coach Justin Langer after speaking to him for the first time.

Langer called up the South Australian last week to familiarize himself with the players he will be working with shortly.

“He sounds like a ripping bloke,” Carey said of his phone conversation last Friday.

“When I had a chat with him – and I guess it’s always a bit nerve-wracking meeting up with the Australian coach for the first time – he was just really calming.

“Sort of in that Buddhist monk kind of way. He spoke quietly and slowly which made me feel more so much more comfortable.

“So I think he’s going to be quite tough in terms of getting the best out of everyone, but it sounds like he’s also quite a calming influence as well, and every WA player I’ve spoken to has absolutely loved him.”

Carey is a fit, committed professional but he has targeted mental toughness as an area he can learn a lot from Langer.

“I do like the hard work and pride myself on that to some extent, so I’m looking forward to perhaps learning a bit more about mental toughness from him as well,” Carey told cricket.com.au.

“From what I see of the WA boys and his (Langer’s) own interest in martial arts, he’s also very strong on fitness so that’s great, because I like that.”

Carey hopes that the forthcoming tours to England and Zimbabwe have the same team spirit that he found during the Trans-Tasman tri-series earlier this year.

ALSO READ: Langer hopes to call on ‘scary’ Lynn

“The culture in that group was really good, we did a lot of team stuff together being on the road for a few weeks and just hanging out together so it was just really enjoyable,” Carey said.

“We were winning games and it just felt like we built up this momentum to where we had become a really dominant T20 side.

“It was in that Eden Park game, when we fielded first and the ball was flying around everywhere, and it got to around the 17-over mark when I was looking around at our guys and everyone was smiling.

“It was just the most enjoyable game of cricket I have ever played.

“Even our fielders, it was so weird – they were scoring so quickly and heavily but I’d run past our guys and it was like ‘how good is this atmosphere?’

“The crowd was going crazy, yet everyone just had a big smile on their faces and it somehow felt like we were going to make the runs (the 244 needed) when we went in at the change of innings.

“It was just a really close group of guys.

“I didn’t feel like I was a third or fourth gamer in that side, it was a really easy transition into that level of cricket because of the coaches and support staff as well as the senior players we had, and the young guys with all the energy.

“It was something I look back on and hopefully the next tour is like that – it was pretty cool.”

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