Defending champion - a new role for Fleming and New Zealand

New Zealand captain Stephen Fleming heads to Sri Lanka and the ICC Champions Trophy tournament in a rare position - defending champion.

The TelstraClear Black Caps' success in Kenya two years ago was the first, and so far only, occasion a New Zealand team had won an international tournament.

And while the nature of the tournament may have changed, the New Zealanders are looking forward to their defence.

"We have good memories from the last tournament and there are financial rewards available but we do go into it with pride as the defending champions. It is a different format, and it is do-or-die with having to play Australia first up.

"The pressure will be on from ball one," he said.

Fleming admitted the weeks since the end of the West Indies tour did not really feel like a complete break from the game but said the team has been targeting their defence of the title for some time.

"We saw the West Indies tour as the last step in a big programme over the 18 months and we wanted to finish with some good results. The win over England in Auckland was a good effort as much for the personal feelings for us as for the public perception," he said.

The winning of the West Indies Test series had been the perfect way to finish that phase of the team's development.

Players have been using their spare time of recent weeks to do fitness work and to rebuild their strength while also focusing on what lies ahead for the side.

Fleming said the emergence of more players of international quality had been important during the past season because, for a country with fewer resources than the majority of opponents, New Zealand needed to have more players who were playing well.

It was important to the team, and to New Zealand cricket overall, to have a solid core of players capable of performing on the international stage.

Shane Bond's emergence as a fast bowler of genuine class, the investment in Ian Butler who had a huge future, and the development of Scott Styris and Robbie Hart in the West Indies were among the most important things to have come out of the season.

In regard to his personal play, Fleming said he thoroughly enjoyed the Australian series. It was what he had spent six months with Middlesex for and the team's performance and his own batting were the highlight of his career so far.

It had been disappointing not to get over South Africa as much as was wanted in the one-day series but it was a successful venture to lose just the one game in the whole season to the Australians, and that only as the result of a spectacular Michael Bevan innings.

New Zealand's one-day game still had a lot of room for improvement but it was developing and there was still time before the World Cup to get it right.

"We are very close to the playing combinations we want.

"Game plan wise, we have it in place and are implementing it.

"But for it to succeed we need to have the senior players being more consistent. When that happens you will see the game plan coming into effect," he said.

It needed six to eight of the older hands in the side achieving that consistency.

Fleming didn't see the two Test matches against India at Christmas as an impediment to the one-day development.

"We love Test cricket and that is something for us to look forward to in the overall programme."

Not surprisingly, Fleming said that if he could have a wish list for the World Cup it would be to have an injury free squad, and that was at the top of everyone's list.

Chris Cairns was part of that, while having Bond and Daniel Vettori in good shape was also important not only because of their contribution to the side but also because of the competition it created.

Fleming said the way players like Styris and Hart stood up in the West Indies had been evidence that the return to a double round of State Championship play was starting to pay dividends.

New Zealand Cricket re-introduced the double round two summers ago and its worth has been apparent when players are called into international play.

The domestic competition needed to be strong and to be producing players who were giving consistently high performances across a season.

"It is still not enough. A while back it was a case of players having a couple of good performances and being touted as New Zealand players. But now they have to be much more consistent across an entire season and that gives us a much better product when they step up," he said.