North start title race on front foot

Defending champions BCB North Zone will be looking to retain the title when they take on second-placed Prime Bank South Zone in the championship-deciding sixth and final round Bangladesh Cricket League match starting in Khulna today. Their current position in the points table make North the frontrunners, but South have an ace up their sleeves in the return of the most inspirational cricketer in Bangladesh -- Mashrafe Bin Mortaza.

With 60 points in five games, a draw will be enough for North Zone to clinch the title while South Zone, who are 13 points behind, will not only need a win but will have to win big to become champions. A winning team can gain a maximum of 19 points -- 10 points for a win and up to nine bonus points from first-innings achievements.

Both teams faced each other in the third round in January and the game ended in a draw at the Shaheed Kamruzzaman Stadium in Rajshahi.

The Sheikh Abu Naser Stadium in Khulna has hosted just one BCL game this season, and the third-round game between Islami Bank East Zone and Walton Central Zone was a run-fest as a total of 1389 runs were scored for the loss of just 16 wickets. East Zone posted a mammoth 735 runs in their first innings with three hundreds and a double hundred from Zakir Hossain.

Only two games of the 10 so far this season have produced a result and in both occasions North Zone registered wins – the nine-wicket first-round defeat of Central Zone and the comprehensive innings-and-28-run win over East Zone in the fifth round.

South, however, will be eager to have the services of Bangladesh ODI skipper Mashrafe, who happens to be the best seam bowler in the country.

"As I play only one format in international cricket, it's important for me to keep myself match fit, which is the reason I am playing the last round of the BCL," Mashrafe told reporters in Mirpur yesterday before leaving for Khulna.

Apart from Masharfe, the likes of Tushar Imran -- the only Bangladeshi to score 10,000 first class runs  and also the top run-scorer in the league with 660 runs at a staggering average of 94.28 and four hundreds -- will play a vital role along with another milestone man in Abdur Razzak, who is the first Bangladeshi to 500 first-class wickets and also the highest wicket-taker in the league with 32 scalps.

Soumya Sarkar and Imrul Kayes, who were among six players to be jettisoned from the national central contracts, will also look to make an impact with the bat for South.

The pitch will be another major character and will be a vital topic of discussion among the teams after the green tracks in both games of the fifth round in Mirpur and Rajshahi offered a lot of purchase for the bowlers. The weather too will have a role to play; the forecast for today is fine but rain is expected in the next three days in Khulna.

In the other game, third-placed Central Zone (42 points) will lock horns with East Zone in Rajshahi, who are a point behind their opposition, but both teams are already out of contention for the title.