Shakib pledges good cricket
Bangladesh skipper Shakib Al Hasan is confident of throwing a tough challenge to the number one Test team in the world and give the cricket fans the taste of a very competitive match.
The Tigers skipper shrugged off any suggestion of any ruggedness from not playing Test for over a period of five months. Bangladesh played their last Test series against West Indies back in July 2009.
"It is true we didn't play a Test match for quite sometime, but hopefully that won't pose any major problem for us to adapt to the Test mould," Shakib said while talking to reporters at a practice session at the Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium here yesterday afternoon.
"We batted well in the last ODIs of the tri-nation series and want to show improvement in our game in the field, not through words," said a confident skipper.
"I think the battle between India and Bangladesh this time will be an interesting one because the opponents have a long batting line-up while we have a few quality bowlers. However, we don't bother much about the result of the match. But a draw will be good for us. I am confident that we will have a good chance if we can score 700 runs in the two innings," he said.
The last Test match against India at this venue in May 2007 was drawn due to rain while Sri Lanka won the last Test match here by four wickets in January last year.
Curator of Bangladesh Cricket Board Shafiul Alam Belal informed that the match would be played on the third pitch, among seven, on the ground.
"This pitch is brown in colour," he said, opting not to make any comment on how the pitch may behave.
The hosts arrived in the port city at around 11:30am yesterday while the visitors arrived at around 4:30pm amid tight security.
Bangladesh team held their first practice session at 2:30pm while the visitors will have their first practice at 2:30pm today.
BCB director and the venue chairman Sirajuddin Mohammad Alamgir said all preparations have already been taken to host the match successfully.
A total of 13,000 tickets in three categories will be available at all the sales centres of Grameenphone from today. The ticket price is fixed at Tk 300 for club house, Tk 200 for special enclosure and Tk 50 for gallery, he said.
Tickets will also be available at the makeshift counter of Grameenphone at the stadium premise during the matchdays, informed Sirajuddin.
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