Time to arrange longer version BD 'A' games vs. Associates?

[fwullah]

http://www.cricinfo.com/ci-icc/conte...ry/443146.html

SL A, WI, ENG and AUS have arranged to play a few matches (See the above link) against some of the Associates from January to June 2010. Can't we arrange some games between our Bangladesh 'A' or Bangladesh U-19 sides with a few of the Associate teams sometime this year?

2011 World Cup will be over by April 2011, then we'll need to a few players with some experience in longer version cricket - as back up to our current Bangladesh national squad, if not for anything else.

Some of the Associate teams also perform pretty well against each other; at least our players used to lack this experience when they were playing at that stage - before ICC Trophy era, before test status. I've seen some of the scorecards of ICC Intercontinental Cup and Intercontinental Shield games and a few of the team performances are quite intense.

[AsifTheManRahman]

The experience from these games would be invaluable. But good luck telling Lotus that.

[al Furqaan]

yes, our A team or U-19 team should play 4 day (three is too short) against associates. ireland, afghanistan, are serious sides...but playing the next 3-4 teams would be good stuff for our boys.

[al Furqaan]

actually according to that link, only Ireland is playing a 4-dayer against Jamaican national team or WI A. but regardless, we should do what fwullah proposed.

[Tiger444]

Good stuff fwullah..this would definitely help us with our cricket..our A team does not get enough tours which is not good..this would get our players to play better against the big dogs..playing teams like Kenya, Netherlands, Afghanistan, Scotland and Namibia would not be easy for even our A team..these teams are pretty good and would really challenge our boys..also if they can play on different pitches such as green tops, belters, and slow turners..this would help our batting big time...the problem with our cricket is that players make the big jump from domestics to international cricket..our academy team seems okay but it seems there is a gap there between that and the national team..thats where A team comes in..for example.. players like marshal ayub, jahurul islam and shuvagoto hom should really be playing A team cricket now if they are going to be serious contenders for the national team..

[Rabz]

Actually, not only i think it is time, i think its been long overdue.

The experience would be invaluable, in all respect.
I've always thought we should bridge the gap between the G8 and the Associates.

[Eshen]

Arranging 4-day matches against associate countries on our home soil most likely will be a pointless practice. Those tours may help associate teams, but not so much our players. Our players can learn better by playing each other in NCL.

Sending A-team to a tour of Ireland or Scotland may be a different story though.

[Rabz]

Eshen my friend, dont you think international exposure is always good, irrespective of the opponents?? We are not talking about playing the core 15 in these games, its those in the pipeline.

Winning is a habit and more importantly, requires a different state of mind.

And its not a bad idea to get into that state of mind by playing opponents with whom we'd have better chance of winning.

Offcourse they are not going to become world beaters by playing associate teams, but atleast they can get exposure to variety which will help them to understand their own game better. Just playing NCL wont give you that diversity.

Yes, you are right, sending teams to Scotland and Ireland would be good idea, but we could not have just one way, our way, could we??

If we are trying to master their condition, i'm sure they'd also want to master our condition.
Hence home and away series would be necessary.

[Eshen]

Rabz, for international exposure to players in pipeline, BCB arranged two academy tours and two A-team tours last summer. Year before that the A-team went on a prolonged tour to British Isles (we also had good number of academy matches that summer). So you see, our summers were fairly packed.

Now, BCB also have to make domestic leagues competitive. I am not opposed to have players pulled out of NCL to play against quality opponents, but I don't think we should make that sacrifice for associate countries.

As for associate countries, we did our fair bit to give them international exposure.

[Rabz]

Yes, playing associates would only suit during the off seasons.

Had our domestic league been of a higher standard, we probably wouldn't have to go thru this bypass method.

[Miraz]

I am with Eshen here.

If you want to play at home, it should be against A team of Test playing nations.

Away tours against associates will be very helpful during off-season.

[Eshen]

BTW, do notice how academy players such as Shafiul Islam and Saqlain Sajib developed during summer. As I said in another thread, BCB can always do better, but it's not like they are doing nothing to groom players in pipeline.

[Tiger444]

Originally Posted by Eshen
BTW, do notice how academy players such as Shafiul Islam and Saqlain Sajib developed during summer. As I said in another thread, BCB can always do better, but it's not like they are doing nothing to groom players in pipeline.

Yes BCB is doing a pretty good job actually..people do give them a lot of crap but in the end they are starting to groom young talents in to handy players..marshal ayub can be a great example of how he came from the academy team and played a good amount of away tours..shuvagoto hom is also another player who came from the system..i believe however BCB can do better with A team tours..but again no board is perfect..and in general people are not perfect..

[wiseshah]

Invite India pak srilnka saf aussie A for 5 day match series

weak opponents won't help us

[al Furqaan]

well, i think the test nations can do more to help teh associates. its pretty lousy that those teams rarely get to play the big boys. true it offers nothing to the big sides, but must we be so selfish?

remember when BD were just making up the numbers in Asia Cup after Asia Cup? that excitement brought us to whatever stage we're at (plus of course some luck). perhaps we could do the same, especially when countries like afghanistan and ireland are showing so much promise. countries like kenya or bermuda are totally hopeless, but not the top two or three associate sides.

[Eshen]

Asad, I don't think we are being selfish, Bangladesh played associate countries more often than others in past years.

There is no reason for us to feel guilty as long associate countries find other teams to play them (and apparently they are not having much trouble doing so). Say for example, if Ireland comes to visit India, BCCI can field a decent team against them without having to strain the talent pool in the country much. But our talent pool is still not that big, with national players gone, it will make a big difference for NCL if BCB pull away 11 decent players.

[Gowza]

if you want BD players getting good FC experience send teams to australia and south africa to play the stronger state/province teams, associates don't play much FC cricket plus the quality is low. you want the BD up and comers player the better teams so they get use to the quality or at least have a look at it and see where they need to get to.

[beshideshi]

Instead of organizing such tours, we can send our A team to Duleep trophy/or some other FC competition. As they last for longer and really test the temperament of the players. SL sent their A team to India last year, we could do that. Or we could invite Afghanistan/nepal to come and play in our FC
And I think we should send our A team to Ireland, as in near future[2015~] Ireland will become almost equivalent to Bangladesh, and playing in those conditions can only help the next generation of players.

[Gowza]

and if you want to play longer version cricket against the associates it should be the academy team or an u21 team rather than the A team. the A team should be sent to the test playing nations to play FC cricket, and sending an u19 team would be kind of insulting even if they are an associate unless they were playing one of ftheir academy or u19/u21 teams. reckon it would be cool if they sent an u19 team to play some aussie 1st grade teams, something that shouldn't be too hard to organise and would be a really good experience for the u19s.

[cricman]

South African and Windies A are touring in April

[al-Sagar]

every season after completion of our NCL, pick a Bangladesh A and Bangladesh u-19 squad based on the best performers of the current NCL. also 2-3 national team discarad out of form or confidence may be included in the A team

now the A team must go to tour a TEST team and play 4-5 four day mathces against their local FC teams. like if we go england we can play county teams. if we go india we may play ranji teams.

also before the series we may have a short tour to an associate team. like before the tour at ENGLAND why not have short visit to scotland and ireland. before visitin SA, we may go to Zimbabwe or Kenya.

the u-19s can host other u-19s or may have tours to other TEST playing nations to play against u-19s .

[bujhee kom]

It is a very good thread and important issue raised by Fwallah apa! We must arrange for our cricketers to play more first class matches against outside teams, be it Associate countries or the top 8, we just don't play enough first class matches and our first class local league is a joke and then we can not expect us to go out there and fight a Test match!

[Fazal]

Team-A activity is close to none at this moment. We (fan and reporters) need to give more attention to this and force BCB address this issue.

When we hear that our national coach is not happy at all with a certain player's performance but ended with the comment like, "we don't have any replacement for him yet" .... then you have to ask....what BCB is doing to help the national team/Selectors/coach with constant flow of prepared players (players from team-a ready to step in) incase we need some due to injurey/retirement/non-production of national player(s).

[Spitfire_x86]

A Team activity is close to none in every country for most of the year. A team is more like a dumping ground of permanent national team discards than a grooming place of emerging cricketers.

I remember our matches against A teams from mid-90's to pre-test status period. Very few of those opposition A team players made notable career in national level. As for us, the best we got from A team cricket is Tushar Imran.

[AsifTheManRahman]

Originally Posted by Spitfire_x86
I remember our matches against A teams from mid-90's to pre-test status period. Very few of those opposition A team players made notable career in national level.

That's not entirely true. Rahul Dravid, Sourav Ganguly, Venkatesh Prasad, Russel Arnold, Upul Chandana, T Samaraweera and many more went on to have successful international careers. Even the likes of Sairaj Bahutule, Rajesh Chauhan and Vikram Rathour represented India later on and had sporadic success. We played against most of these guys back in the nineties.

But of course, not everyone who plays in his country's A team eventually goes on to play in the national team.