**Official** Bangladesh in Sri Lanka

[Prince EWS]

But regardless do you think its a positive or good move to have two captains.

I think it's fairly irrelevant. IMO, Bangladesh's best chance of winning each test match is to have Rajin Saleh as captain. What that means for the ODI side isn't really relevant to what you should do with your test side as far as I'm concerned.

 

[Perm]

Bangladesh routed

 

[chaminda_00]

Nice to see Malinga improve his stats...

 

[chaminda_00]

I think it's fairly irrelevant. IMO, Bangladesh's best chance of winning each test match is to have Rajin Saleh as captain. What that means for the ODI side isn't really relevant to what you should do with your test side as far as I'm concerned.

At the stage in development Bangladesh are they can't afford to concentrate on just one form. I think we are seeing in this Test Match and the Indian series, what happens to them when they separate both forms and work to different goals in either form. If you had two captains you would have one captain pulling th team one way and another captain pulling the team another way. They would end up going no where in both forms IMO.

 

[NZTailender]

Sigh. Please pass 250 twice in the next match Bangladesh. Oh, and bowl better too. And score centuries.



Then we'll be sweet.

 

[Nishan]

Sigh. Please pass 250 twice in the next match Bangladesh. Oh, and bowl better too. And score centuries.



Then we'll be sweet.

Annoying thing is they got ablity to score 250 in each innings but ever from their first test when they made 400 and followed up with 91 consistensy in their batting is lacking otherwise they will atleast be drawing lot more tests like Zim or Sri Lanka did when they began test cricket.

I cant see them getting 20 wickets in a game for now though

 

[shehanwije]

Murali closes on another Warne record.

Murali got another MOM award today. He is now at 17 awards, and almost over the top of Warne (18)

Player Tests Awards

Warne, S K 145 18
Wasim Akram 104 17
Kallis, J H* 107 16
Muralitharan, M* 112 17
Ponting, R T* 110 14
Waugh, S R 168 14
Ambrose, C E L 98 14
Lara, B C 131 12
Botham, I T 102 12
Border, A R 156 11
de Silva, P A 93 11
Imran Khan 88 11

It is also looking more likely that Murali will break 700 wkts against Bangl in this series and Warne's record in Australia. In almost 25% less tests. What a champion!

 

[Fiery]

Murali got another MOM award today. He is now at 17 awards, and almost over the top of Warne (18)

Player Tests Awards

Warne, S K 145 18
Wasim Akram 104 17
Kallis, J H* 107 16
Muralitharan, M* 112 17
Ponting, R T* 110 14
Waugh, S R 168 14
Ambrose, C E L 98 14
Lara, B C 131 12
Botham, I T 102 12
Border, A R 156 11
de Silva, P A 93 11
Imran Khan 88 11

It is also looking more likely that Murali will break 700 wkts against Bangl in this series and Warne's record in Australia. In almost 25% less tests. What a champion!

Champion ch.... never mind

 

[Perm]

It is also looking more likely that Murali will break 700 wkts against Bangl in this series and Warne's record in Australia. In almost 25% less tests. What a champion!

Considering he has 150 wickets again Bangladesh and Zimbabwe then it isn't that special.

 

[Mahindinho]

Considering he has 150 wickets again Bangladesh and Zimbabwe then it isn't that special.

Yeah, it is a bit devalued, but it's not exactly Murali's fault.

SL have played an awful lot of Tests against B'desh and Zim, esp. the former. I do suspect it might be something to do with them being a fellow smaller sub-continental nation. Unlike the other major cricketing nations, SL only got Test status recently, and they did struggle to get away series, especially in England -- didn't they go something like 7 or 8 years in the 80s/90s without a Test series in Blighty? Maybe they're helping Bangladesh out a bit. I know the players would rather play the big boys.

Mind you, you can argue that Warne's played more against the mighty 1990s England, whose mastery of playing spin comes pretty close to the current batch of Bangladeshis

 

[The Sean]

How can they justify this being a three Test series, but then only travelling to play two against Australia in Australia?

Not a shot at Murali here before it flames up, but Sri Lanka play an extraordinary amount of cricket against Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. I think by the end of this series it will be something like 24 Tests out of 113 for Murali against those two countries - and then in the second half of next year SL are due to play 6 Tests in a row against either Zimbabwe or Bangladesh. If he plays all SL's matches then by the end of 2008 he will have played something like 30 Tests out of 130 against them.

Amazing when you consider that Australia has played a total of just 7 Tests against those two countries. I would have thought that the distribution of series would be a little more equitable than that, though I suppose as has been mentioned SL are relative newcomers themselves and want to help out the other new boys, whereas Australia has made so secret of its feelings that they're not "real" Tests.

 

[Raghav]

Sigh. Please pass 250 twice in the next match Bangladesh. Oh, and bowl better too. And score centuries.



Then we'll be sweet.

I dont think its gonna happen next time around...Sanjay Manjrekar hinting that the wicket for the 2nd test would suit Malinga, Fernando...

 

[Mahindinho]

How can they justify this being a three Test series, but then only travelling to play two against Australia in Australia?

Because that's probably all the Aussies were prepared to give them?

I've just trawled Cricinfo, looking for SL away Test matches against England and Australia:

Eng vs SL in England
Aug 1984 - 1 Test
Aug 1988 - 1 Test
Aug 1991 - 1 Test
Aug 1998 - 1 Test
May 2002 - 3 Tests
May 2006 - 3 Tests

Aus vs SL in Australia
Feb 1988 - 1 Test
Dec 1989 - 2 Tests
Dec 1995 - 3 Tests
Jul 2004 - 2 Tests

There are some SERIOUS gaps there!

Admittedly, there were a few ODIs, 'A' matches, etc. in between, but no Tests. And these were sides that were probably a cut above current Bangladesh. That's not to take anything away from Ashraful's bunch, but they do need more first class cricket before they're anything like competitive over five days.

I know the lack of Tests in England in the '90s really rankled -- it was seen as arrogance from the English (and Welsh!) Cricket Board.

Thankfully, the ICC have put a stop to that sort of thing with their "thou shalt play all the other nations home and away within this time period" stuff...and there's much more international cricket going on nowadays than there was back then...but it's still up to the individual boards how many Tests are played.

Not a shot at Murali here before it flames up, but Sri Lanka play an extraordinary amount of cricket against Zimbabwe and Bangladesh. I think by the end of this series it will be something like 24 Tests out of 113 for Murali against those two countries - and then in the second half of next year SL are due to play 6 Tests in a row against either Zimbabwe or Bangladesh. If he plays all SL's matches then by the end of 2008 he will have played something like 30 Tests out of 130 against them.

That's A LOT -- I didn't realise it was that many! At the end of their careers, I really would like to see Murali's stats vs Warne's without taking recent Zim (Andy Flower's lot were a proper side) and Bangladesh into account.

 

[Mahindinho]

Oh, and something else I discovered from my research -- Russell Arnold was the first international cricketer to use a Woodworm bat.

 

[Nishan]

Champion ch.... never mind

I beg ur pardon

Kiwi are we? not suprised

 

[Nishan]

If he does chuck he is a bloody good chucker

Challenge many people would be able to create an action like that!

 

[Mahindinho]

Nishan, don't rise to it mate.

It's been done. Some people think he's a chucker, some don't. It's a matter of personal opinion, no matter what each camp says, and people are not going to change their minds on it.

 

[Fiery]

Nishan, don't rise to it mate.

It's been done. Some people think he's a chucker, some don't. It's a matter of personal opinion, no matter what each camp says, and people are not going to change their minds on it.

Good post that

 

[pup11]

Some people think Murali chucks and some think he doesn't, but the bottom line is he would end up as the highest wicket taker in both forms of the game. But still i would rate Warney the best ever spin bowler to have ever played the game and if i am not wrong he has only played one test against Zim and two against Bangladesh.

 

[chaminda_00]

Considering he has 150 wickets again Bangladesh and Zimbabwe then it isn't that special.

If he had a choice he would have played all those Test against Australia and England. But as Mahindinho pointed out they don't want to play them at home and if so they only want 2 Tests. This series coming up in Australia will be the first time they played Australia in the main summer since 96, over 10 years. If the established countries still don't want to play you have to play Test against other sides to fill up your home calender and get some matches away from home. All that just a sign that most Test nations still see us as a minnow in Test cricket.

Just look at how many matches Sri Lanka has played with NZ lately. Basically there is only 3 countiries that are happy to play us regularly in Test Cricket. But even the Kiwis are tired of playing us so much and would rather play other sides. But again team would rather play the other teams.