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Back to square one

Friday, November 14 2003

The England tour that ended a couple of days ago was nothing short of a disaster for all concerned in Bangladesh cricket. As usual, they lost all three One-day matches and the two test matches that were scheduled. The team performed well below the standards they had reached in Australia and Pakistan recently. After viewing those two tours, one would have looked forward to a better performance against the English. Let alone a better performance, there is talk of a rift within the team.

The Test series started off brightly with Bangladesh giving their more illustrious opponents a good run for their money. So much so, Vaughan had to admit that Bangladesh were the better team on one of the days. But during the last day of that First test match, cracks suddenly started to appear as the captain failed miserably with the bat once more. There was another collapse and Bangladesh failed to post a better lead for England to chase. But all was forgotten after considering the performance of Mohammad Rafique, Mashrafee and Mushfiqur Rahman.

The second test match had a better start. Bangladesh made England scamper in the first innings, which was witness to a huge collapse by the Englishmen. Mashrafee caught the eye of everyone with his pace and unplayable bounce off the pitch but he was soon injured in the second innings. The batting failed in the first innings and when there was a need to survive during the second innings chase, two batsmen were run out and a couple more threw their wickets away.

There was a colossal cry for the head of the captain. Khaled Mahmud had to suffer the berate of his nation. The ODI team came together on the day of the first match and that was the beginning of the ordeal. Nafis Iqbal, Moniruzzaman, Jamaluddin and Manjarul Islam all failed in their first appearance for Bangladesh. Habibul Bashar was mysteriously dropped to make room for Moniruzzaman. One would pray that there isn’t any doubt in the mind of the team think-tank about this man as he is the sole world-class performer in the team. His style and technique may be an eyesore but he scores all the time.

Only one man who stood out was all-rounder Mushfiqur Rahman. He was brought back to the team for the test matches as the opening bowling partner to Mashrafee and he did a lot of favour to his backers. He bowled his heart out in Chittagong and took several blows in his body in both the matches just for the sake of survival. An honest trier, Mushfiq again performed well in the ODI’s and that prompted one local company to gift him with a three-wheeler after the third ODI.

There is a lot of work to be done to the national team and Dav Whatmore would have his hands full. The skipper said that he wouldn’t quit but there is a certainty of the man being sacked. The coach has already suggested that there would be a lot of changes for the next tour. The likes of Kapali, Saleh, Omar and Mahmud must now accomplish themselves in the local league as well as the National League coming up.

Written by Isam

Posted by James