Not waiting for Hathurusingha anymore: Hassan
After more than a week of speculation about the reasons for head coach Chandika Hathurusingha's resignation and whether he will reconsider his decision, Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) president Nazmul Hassan said yesterday that the board is no longer waiting for the Sri Lankan's return. Hassan also said that there is a strong possibility that former Bangladesh captain-turned-BCB director and current Dhaka Dynamites coach Khaled Mahmud will step into the breach at least for the Sri Lanka series at the turn of the year.
Hassan had said on November 9, when news broke of Hathurusingha sending a resignation letter midway through the South Africa tour the previous month, that they will wait for Hathurusingha to return to Bangladesh and try to talk him into reconsidering his decision. Hathurusingha was contracted to coach the team till the 2019 World Cup in England.
As news of Hathurusingha's imminent deal to coach Sri Lanka has started to trickle through, however, the BCB boss ruled out a return and seemed to harden his usually conciliatory stance regarding Bangladesh's most successful coach.
"We are not waiting for Hathurusingha; we are waiting for his report," said Hassan during the day's BPL matches at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium in Mirpur. "He said he will submit it within two or three weeks. We have to know whether he is leaving because of personal reasons or whether it is because of us. If it is personal, then there is no problem. There is no problem even if it is something to do with us, but we should know about it.
"As I said before, if someone does not want to stay, we do not want to force him to stay. But we need to know some things from him; as a professional coach, we need his report on the whole series and the reason for his resignation. Now if he thinks that without any particular reason he has decided to become the coach of Sri Lanka, that is a different issue.
Hassan said that during the 40-day tour of South Africa, during which Bangladesh lost all seven international matches, a communication gap had developed between coach and the board.
"I spoke to him after the first Test [which Bangladesh lost by 333 runs on October 1], and that was the only time I talked to him during tour," Papon added. "He emailed his resignation after the second Test [which ended in an innings and 254-run defeat on October 8], so he probably decided to quit during the tour."
Contrary to rumours, Hassan denied that there was a problem between Hathurusingha and the senior players, before throwing in the trademark statement that defeats what came before. "These problems are only reported in the media; I have not seen any such problems. Shakib [Al Hasan], Tamim [Iqbal] and Mashrafe [Bin Mortaza] had no issue; [Mahmudullah] Riyad has no issues with anyone. There might be one, since there has been talk about some statements that [Test skipper] Mushfiqur [Rahim] has made, during this very series [second Test against South Africa, when he lashed out against management]. But even then, I don't think there is a problem."
With names of a number of international coaches doing the rounds recently, Hassan admitted that the BCB have started shopping for international coaches but said that they may be looking locally for the immediate future.
"If we don't get a foreign coach before the Sri Lanka series, then we will look at a local coach," Hassan said when asked about the Sri Lanka series. "We have Khaled Mahmud Shujon; the possibilities of him taking over are highest."