BCB to merge HP, A teams

Bangladesh chief selector Minhajul Abedin. Photo: Star

Bangladesh Cricket Board chief selector Minhajul Abedin announced yesterday that they are going to merge the High Performance squad and A team training camps and that the new camp will begin on May 23. Players from the HP team will also feature for the A team.

The A team's next assignment is a series against Sri Lanka A at home, followed by a tour of Ireland and Minhajul said that they will utilise a mixture of experience alongside youth in the second string national side for those fixtures.

"We are merging the HP with the A team. We will choose a 20-22 member squad for the HP, and add a few A team players to that. The HP programme will start from the 23rd of next month, and we will start the A team work with that as well," Minhajul told reporters at the Sher-e-Bangla National stadium in Mirpur yesterday.

He also informed that the board are searching for cricketers who can immediately replace national team players and also those who can make it to the national level within one to two years.

"It will be a combination of seniors and juniors. I can't say the names. Let us prepare the team first, we will sit and decide after the BCL who will go to HP and who will go to A team. Two weeks later there is a national training camp, and we will have to choose a preliminary squad for that as well. We can give the details next week," he added.

Tushar Imran, the first Bangladeshi player to score 10,000 first-class runs, has been in terrific form recently with three centuries on the trot to his name for South Zone in the BCL. And naturally, since Tushar played for Bangladesh between 2001 and 2007, it was asked whether the 34-year-old could make a comeback to at least the A team. However, the chief selector was noncommittal on the issue.

Minhajul added that the national cricketers are supposed to report by May 13 to begin the conditioning camp the following day.