Missing a 4th bowler
The inclusion of another specialist bowler in the team might not have made any difference in the ultimate outcome of the first Test against South Africa on Monday.
Bangladesh lost the match by five wickets on the fourth morning at the Mirpur Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium.
But the team management's strategy to field three specialist bowlers -- Mashrafe Bin Mortaza, Shahadat Hossain and Mohammad Rafique -- has raised many questions to answer.
The home team's intention was very clear: they wanted to prolong the batting line-up as much as they could. But the question is that, was there any significant upshot in the batting? The answer is definitely negative as scores of 192 and 182 hardly portrayed the team's improvement and if the Tigers earned anything from the Test, it was because of a special bowling effort from Shahadat Hossain, who claimed nine wickets in the match.
It could have been a different story if leading paceman Mashrafe could contribute something with the new ball rather he was wicketless in the game. And captain Mohammad Ashraful was helpless to use any other option especially in the initial stages of the South Africa second innings where they defended a little over 200 runs.
The main point is that it was too defensive and a conservative idea to concentrate only on the batting after spending more than seven years in the Test fold.
Without any doubt, Jamie Siddons's prime concern is with his brittle batting but he should understand that the improved batting from his top-order batsmen is the only solution of the paramount headache.
Former chief selector Faruque Ahmed also branded it as a negative idea to field three specialist bowlers in a Test match.
"I can remember that during my tenure I had to face the question a few times when we played five specialist bowlers. The question was why we always went for four bowlers and interestingly now the question raised is why three bowlers," said the former national skipper smilingly.
"Undoubtedly we played a good Test match in Mirpur against South Africa and Shahadat (Hossain) bowled brilliantly apart from Mohammad Rafique's spin. But I must say it's a negative idea to play three specialist bowlers. You can do it in one-day matches sometimes, but not in Test.
"If you go with three bowlers it means you start the match with a negative frame of mind. I don't think we are in such a stage to think like that and I firmly believe that it will always take you to the back foot," he explained.
The incumbent chief selector Rafiqul Alam however dismissed the opinion that they played the match with three bowlers as he considered Shakib Al Hasan as a specialist option.
"Definitely he (Shakib) is a specialist left-arm spinner, so you can't say that we played with three specialist bowlers. The unfortunate things was that Shakib could not give his hundred per cent because he suffered a slight injury in his spin finger in the early stages of the match" Rafiq defended.
"And one should understand that we have to emphasise on our batting first. Just think that the result could have been worse had Aftab (Ahmed) and Shakib not scored some runs. And what's wrong in playing four bowlers when a team like India can practice it," he added.
But whatever the explanation of Rafiq, we should let the Tigers grow up rather than hold them back.
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