'Clarke can take all singles he wants'

Bangladesh's practice schedule at Brisbane just got a tad bit more exciting yesterday when Cricket Australia confirmed that captain Michael Clarke would feature for Australia XI in Bangladesh's second practice match on February 5.

The news brought out rather cheeky comments from Bangladesh's team management.

“We will push the field back and try to get him (Clarke) to take as many singles as he wants,” Bangladesh's bowling coach Heath Streak told an Australian Daily yesterday.

Ace allrounder Shakib Al Hasan joined in the fun as well. “He can score as many runs in the practice game as he wants… as long as he does not score runs against us in the World Cup. If he does not play the World Cup, it will be a huge loss (for Australia),” said Shakib.

Bangladesh will play Australia at the Gabba on February 21, a match which is expected to be extremely difficult for the Tigers for a number of reasons.

For one, they will be playing the hosts in their own den and secondly, they will be playing on a wicket that is considered to be one of the fastest in the world. 

According to Cricket Australia (CA), the match will be considered as a 'checkpoint' for Clarke, who is currently in the process of recovering from a hamstring injury. He will be playing as a batsman and in a limited fielding capacity.

Meanwhile, the Tigers resumed training at the Allan Border Ground at Brisbane yesterday after spending a day off on Friday.

“The day off helped the Tigers come back fresh in the camp. They had fun racing against each other on the go-kart track on Friday. But today (Saturday) they were back to some good old hard training. The players skipped a gym session and concentrated more on their skill sets,” team manager Khaled Mahmud told The Daily Star over the phone yesterday.

The unofficial practice matches will be played at Brisbane on the 3rd and 5th of February.

Ausssie XIs

MATCH ONE:  Will Bosisto, Harry Conway, Alex Gregory, Chris Lynn, David Moody, Jaron Morgan, James Muirhead, James Pierson, Nic Stevens, Ashton Turner, Timm Van der Gugten, Sean Willis.

MATCH TWO:  Will Bosisto, Michael Clarke, Harry Conway, Alex Gregory, David Moody, Jaron Morgan, James Muirhead, James Pierson, Nic Stevens, Ashton Turner, Timm Van der Gugten, Sean Willis.