Preview: New look Bangladesh face stiff challenge in Twenty20 World Cup.

[Miraz]

Preview: New look Bangladesh face stiff challenge in Twenty20 World Cup.
Khondaker Mirazur Rahman

Bangladesh's last World Cup appearance in South Africa brings back some dreadful memories in the mind of the Tigers' fans. Bangladesh cricket hit rock bottom at World Cup 2003 held in South Africa. The campaign started with a shock loss against lowly Canada and the demise was capped by a sound thumping at the hand of another associate Kenya at Wanderers Stadium in Johannesburg.

Bangladesh have effectively put those bitter memories behind in the last world cup and finished seventh defeating India and South Africa and emerged as a surprise package of world cricket. When Bangladesh will take the field to face West Indies in the very ground in which they ended their infamous World Cup 2003 campaign, they will definitely try to forget past results and extract confidence from latest outings.

Bangladesh cricket has gone through a complete overhaul in recent times and none of the current squad except skipper Mohammad Ashraful and Alok Kapali is carrying the grief of 2003. Bangladesh have emerged as an exciting team full of exuberance and agility of youth and the selectors did no harm to the reputation by naming a young team with an average age of 22 for the maiden version of Twenty20 world cup.

Bangladesh is placed in group A along with host South Africa and West Indies. According to the format of the game, the Tigers need to win at least one game to have any chance to progress to the second round, and most cricket pundits believe Bangladesh have the firepower to outshine their group opponents in their day.

Undoubtedly Bangladesh have the potential but their transformation of ability into performance is a rare commodity. Since their heroics in the last World Cup Bangladesh cricket is going through a sorry affair and departure of Dave Whatmore hasn’t made things any better, if not worse. Bangladesh is yet to find a replacement for Dave Whatmore, and interim coach Shaun Williams has done little to raise the standard of the team. Mohammad Ashraful, the new Bangladesh skipper, is yet to find his feet and hasn’t done anything significant to inspire his colleagues to perform as a team and come out of the transitional blue period

Bangladesh’s success in the inaugural Twenty20 world cup will depend on their ability to regroup and perform as a team. It’s true they finished the warm up campaign with 3 wins out of 5 outings, but they were carried on the shoulder of a rookie player and the rest repeated their poor showings. Bangladesh group oppositions, South Africa and West Indies, have considerable success in cricket’s spectator friendly version and it will take more than an individual effort to get past the stiff challenge.

In batting, the talent of Tamim Iqbal, rookie Nazimuddin, Aftab Ahmed and skipper Mohammad Ashraful should be enough to create some fireworks at Johannesburg and Cape Town to post challenging scores against their group opponents. The likes of Alok Kapali, Farhad Reza and Mashrafe Mortaza can play a supporting role if the top order can persist with their onslaught. Twenty20 isn’t simply a game of stroke play, it’s more about persistent stroke play and Bangladesh’s talented yet fragile top order more than often fail to continue their aggressive batting leaving too much work for the tail enders. And in most cases Bangladesh tail-enders hardly realize their responsibility with bat except some occasional blitzkrieg display by Mashrafe Mortaza.

Bangladesh invented the art of attacking with left arm army in West Indies and often choked the opposition in the middle resulting in two famous wins against India and South Africa. Bangladesh will be again relying on their left arm army where Syed Rasel is stepping in to compensate the absence of veteran Mohammad Rafiq. Rasel has already established him as one of the best new ball bowler of modern cricket despite his lack of pace, and his style of bowling will be suited in early summer condition of South Africa. While Rasel possesses the unique ability to contain batsman, Bangladesh bowling mainstay left arm spinner Abdur Razzak has got the uncanny ability to pick up regular wickets without being generous with the ball.

Except Razzak and Rasel, Bangladesh bowling lacks penetration to pose any serious threat to their group opponents. Lack of form of Bangladesh pace spearhead Mashrafe Mortaza further worsened the scenario and skipper Mohammad Ashraful’s proactive bowling is hardly making the situation any better. Having said that, Ashraful has little choice as Alok Kapli’s leg spin remained erratic over the years, and Farhad Reza is still learning the trick of getting movement off the pith which is the key to success in Twenty20 cricket.

Bangladesh’s enthusiastic presence on the field can be crucial in saving valuable runs in this shorter version of cricket, but fielders have to capitalize on opportunities offered by opposition which they fail more than often. Catches win matches is an old proverb of cricket and the butter fingered presence of Tigers on the field resulted in ignominious loss against Kenya in the warm up match. Bangladesh must do better than their recent past in capitalizing on opportunities as a single batsman can destroy the opposition in Twenty20, and there is hardly any chance to regroup.

Bangladesh have raised the expectations of its well wishers after the historic success in the last world cup but failed to live up to the expectation. Despite the recent failures, Bangladesh is one of the most exciting teams of the Twenty20 world cup and they are expected to entertain the proteas crowd. Now to make it more than entertainment against oppositions with proven match-winners, the young Tigers must get their acts right and perform as a team. Otherwise, Twenty20 world cup will be yet another learning experience for a talented team who achieved lot less than their potential.

[wiseshah]

the way west indies is playing today, looks like they will crush BD. I hope ashraful can use all his weapons(bowlers) against them. mashrafe needs to get back his form. sakib and razzaq will be very useful in my opinion. I wish rafiq is in the team instead of mahmudullah riad. rafiq could be vital. definitely farhad and mashrafi should bat in top order and before kapali or sakib or mushfiq.

[Roni_uk]

WI is playing this way because SA does not have bowlers like Abdur Razzak. I predicted and wanted this match to go WI's way as Bangladesh has more chance of beating SA than WI [not because we beat them in the world cup but becasue their skills have deteriorated due to average age of the team]. If we beat (insallah) SA, we will have better chance to move onto the second round. I dont think winning just one will get us to the second round, either net rr needs to be better than the other teams or the team we beat needs to be beaten by the third team.

WI RR ~ 11, if only we could score 11 runs an over!

[Nafi]

If Chris gayle falls, then we have the match in our hands.

[Miraz]

Todays match further reveals the level of challenge Bangladesh will face. IMO, it's much stiffer than the challenge faced during the last world cup.

[Sauron]

Post withdrawn upon clarification from the BC Editor.

[meazz1]

Well, after all said and done, SA made WI look like school boys in today's match...
BD will put up a fight against WI, no doubt....

[Hatebreed]

We don't stand a chance against either side unless our batsman do their part. Simple as that.

[Miraz]

Post deleted.

[Sauron]

Originally Posted by Miraz
To clarify it first, it's not an official BC bulletin or article yet. It's a normal thread opened by a member.

In that case, I withdraw my post

[Miraz]

Deleted.

[Sauron]

Deleted

[Miraz]

Bangladesh must contain the opponents within 150 to have any chance of winning.

[Kabir]

Deleted. (I guess that's the fashion in this thread )

Twenty20 isn't the type of game that BD has played a whole lot. And we know the lack of firepower that BD has. Having said all that, and at the risk of sounding like a hypocrate, an "honorable defeat" is quite okay to me.

I'm not taking BD as a bad team or anything...it's just that, in terms of creating fireworks, BD doesn't stand a chance against WI, and may be against SA as well.

[Kabir]

Originally Posted by Miraz
Bangladesh must contain the opponents within 150 to have any chance of winning.

Difficult, but not impossible. Variation in bowling is important. And in Twenty20, my honest opinion is that such variation is missing from our team at the moment. I hope our boys prove me wrong, however.

[Miraz]

Originally Posted by Kabir
Difficult, but not impossible. Variation in bowling is important. And in Twenty20, my honest opinion is that such variation is missing from our team at the moment. I hope our boys prove me wrong, however.

The main problem is in our batting. At current form we have no chance to post even 150+ score against our group opponents.

If batsmen can post 160+ score, bowlers have the ability to take the match to wire.

[Dhruvo]

yeah,i liked the article as usual excellent work,the strategy against WI wil be to get gayle the danger man out as an early wicket and the west indians will be in a bit of pressure then our razzak can come in and increase more pressure,mash is definitely a key player but his lack of form is the main problem,for now we only have razzak,rasel and nazimuddin as the key players,they must perform.

[zainab]

I hope some of our members saw the match between WI and SA. These guys are sluggers of the ball. all they think about is hitting 4's and 6's. I keep shaking my head that there is no way BD can outclass these guys, it will take a miracle. i hope our cricketers watched this game and made notes. Not only Chris Gayle is a danger but nearly all the WI batsmen. If BD drops catches like the WI, then it will be shame. Did you notice how many extras were given away by the Windians? and also how they began to panic. their fielding was poor, i dont think i have seen BD fielded so well since they won the matches against India and SA. I hope they can create that scenario again. When they played the 3rd ODI against SL, their fielding and catching was poor, until Tamim made that brilliant catch.
I doubt whether the WI will repeat this mistake against BD. In fact I think that it is a sure thing to beat BD.
Lets pray and hope for the best. Inshallah.

[Miraz]

Originally Posted by zainab
I hope some of our members saw the match between WI and SA. These guys are sluggers of the ball. all they think about is hitting 4's and 6's. I keep shaking my head that there is no way BD can outclass these guys, it will take a miracle.
Lets pray and hope for the best. Inshallah.

Bangladesh bowling will offer lot more varieties and it will be difficult to score freely especially against Rasel and Razzak.

Everything will depend on our batsmen.

[roaring tigerz]

Our batting form has been erratic so say the least. Every team has a couple of senior players who carry their batting. But our 'seniors' Ashraful and Aftab are just as inconsistent as their more inexperienced counterparts. As Miraz pointed out I doubt we can chase anything over 7-8 an over against the bowling strength of WI or SA Our best bet is to score 150+ batting first and create some panic using Rasel and Razzak's skills.

[Miraz]

Originally Posted by roaring tigerz
Our best bet is to score 150+ batting first and create some panic using Rasel and Razzak's skills.

Couldn't agree more.

Unfortunately we failed to score 150+ even against Uganda in the first innings. We need a team effort to score 150+ against SA or WI.

[Miraz]

Here's Cricinfo's take on Bangladesh team.

Young and reckless
Jamie Alter
September 4, 2007

It's tough to predict how Bangladesh will do at the inaugural Twenty20 World Championship. They've only played three Twenty20 games, winning two (Kenya and Zimbabwe) and losing one. They go into the tournament as rank underdogs still trying to prove themselves in every aspect of the game; perhaps there is no better example of Bangladesh's predicament than their mixed World Cup earlier this year.

Read full

[Miraz]

Originally Posted by Miraz
To clarify it first, it's not an official BC bulletin or article yet.

Now it is ready to be published as an official BC bulletin/article.

[Anher]

Thanks miraz bhai for spending your valuable time for us.

[Miraz]

Originally Posted by I_Knockout_U
Thanks miraz bhai for spending your valuable time for us.

Thanks brother. It's a part of the responsibility.