Continuing their ongoing logjam with the International Cricket Council (ICC), Bangladesh have now alleged their U19 men’s cricket team was treated unfairly following their early exit from the ongoing junior World Cup in Zimbabwe and Namibia. After losing their Super Six match against England, the Bangladesh U19 team has been eliminated from the semi-finals race.
Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) game development coordinator Habibul Bashar claims a punishing travel schedule played a significant role in the team’s unremarkable show at the tournament.
Bangladesh played their opening two matches in Bulawayo – against India on January 17 (lost by 18 runs) and New Zealand on January 20 (rain washout). They then defeated USA in their third and final Group B fixture in Harare on January 23 to enter the Super Six round. They returned to Bulawayo to then face England in the next round earlier this week.
“More than the approach, I think our calculations were lacking [against England and India]. But this [travel schedule] is something I want to highlight, even if people think I’m making excuses," Bashar was quoted as saying by The Daily Star.
Prior to the tournament, Bangladesh played two warm-up matches in Masvingo (January 10) and Harare (January 13) in the span of four days before taking on India in their opening clash three days later in Bulawayo. Masvingo is nearly a four-hour drive from Harare.
“To avoid the boys getting too tired before the India match, the BCB actually paid for an internal flight out of its own pocket because the bus journey was too long and direct flights were scarce," Bashar claimed.
Bashar said that initially, Bangladesh were slated to play both their matches in Masvingo but ICC “suddenly" made changes to the venues.
Bashar said they notified the ICC of the tiring schedule, but it fell on deaf ears.
“The schedule was very unfair to us," Bashar said. “During the initial schedule, we were supposed to play two of our warm-up matches in Masvingo and travel to Bulawayo, which is a four-hour drive, for our opening two group-stages matches. Later, they [ICC] suddenly changed the schedule, and it meant we had to play two of our warm-up games at different venues, travelling back and forth.
“We notified them [of the travel burden] before the tournament started. We asked them to move our practice games to avoid the back-and-forth travel, but they didn’t listen. Once the tournament starts, you can’t really change these things," he added.
Source: News18