Montego Bay: Don’t expect any country to repeat Australia’s feat of winning the World Cup unbeaten this time around.

New Zealand captain Stephen Fleming says his side’s 3-0 series win over Australia last month had helped level out the odds ahead of the World Cup.

“The winner here is going to lose games,” Fleming told a news conference Sunday. “Form at the right time, winning key moments and key games will be crucial.”

Australia’s dominance were also battered when they lost an earlier one-day triangular series, also involving New Zealand, to England.

“In terms of results worldwide a lot of teams were looking around the world to try to get a gauge on form,” Fleming said.

“The message those results sent out was that there are no clear favourites.

“Going into the World Cup, it is going to be anyone’s game.”

With 16 countries competing, teams will have to play 11 games to win the trophy in Barbados on April 28. The World Cup opens with Pakistan against hosts the West Indies on Tuesday. New Zealand’s first game is Friday in St Lucia against England.

Fleming says his side drew confidence from their comprehensive win in the Chappell-Hadlee trophy, where they successfully chased down targets of 337 and 347.

“They gave us the confidence that we needed,” Fleming said.

“We were doing a lot of things both on and off the field which were spot on but the performances on weren’t reflecting that.

“We got put under a lot of pressure from that off the field and we questioned our performances to some degree. The wins died that down and gave the guys confidence to come away with.”

Their preparations since then haven’t gone to plan.

The Black Caps fell to a two-wicket loss to Bangladesh in their first World Cup warm-up match last week in Barbados. They produced a more circumspect batting effort against Sri Lanka and an 18-run win in their other warm-up match two days ago.

Fleming was impressed with the way England rebounded from their morale-sapping 0-5 Ashes loss to Australia to win their first overseas one-day title.

“They not only did it but did it remarkably well and so how they carry that on is going to be the biggest question mark,” Fleming said. “First up against us is a game they’re going to target — if they can maintain that momentum there is no reason they can’t carry it on for a couple of months.”

All the pitches have been re-laid for the tournament, which Fleming said would also be a challenge.

New Zealand have injury concerns over Peter Fulton, who broke the little finger on his left hand on Friday, while fast bowler Mark Gillespie is almost certain to the miss the England match after being sidelined with a virus that is affecting the nerves in his shoulder and neck.