Tigers see ball in their court

There were no questions this time from the Bangladesh Cricket Board [BCB] president Nazmul Hassan over Courtney Walsh's ability to formulate batting plans after the board confirmed the continuation of the West Indian's role as interim head coach of Bangladesh for the upcoming three-match T20I series against Afghanistan. Hassan had said during the Nidahas Trophy in March that he did not expect Walsh, a pace-bowling legend and genuine tailender during his playing days, to provide batting plans.

Interestingly, in the absence of a batting coach, Tigers' T20I vice-captain Mahmudullah Riyad said that the all-time great fast bowler has actually given a few suggestions about his batting that helped him during the training camp.

"The previous day when I was batting in the nets, I was rushing through my shots and was trying to hit hard. Then Walsh came and suggested that I rely on my timing more and also said that I might be gripping the bat too hard. It feels good to have such feedback. It also paid off later as I took the advice and connected well. Everyone is helping each other. It's up to us to take responsibility for ourselves and perform well," Mahmudullah told reporters during the press conference at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium in Mirpur yesterday.

Bangladesh will be leaving for Dehradun tomorrow, where the Tigers will play a practice match on June 1 before the first T20I on June 3, followed by the next two games on June 5 and 7 respectively at the Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium.

The strength of the Afghanistan spin-bowling department, namely the world's top-ranked T20I bowler Rashid Khan and the young Mujeeb Ur Rahman, has been a constant talking point around the Bangladesh camp.

In the absence of regular T20I skipper Shakib Al Hasan, who is busy with his Indian Premier league stint with Sunrisers Hyderbad, both Mahmudullah and Walsh emphasised on their own strengths while also looking to work on the opposition's strengths and weaknesses and informed that it will be a tough tour that the Tigers would want to finish on top.

"We will play them [Afghanistan] in India. They are ahead of us in the T20 rankings, which we are mindful of. I think it will be a very good, keen contest. I am backing my team to do the job. We are not going to be complacent. We are hungry, and we want to get up in the rankings before the World T20 in 2020. We will be up for it," said Walsh when asked who he thought were favourites for the series.

Mahmudullah, on the other hand, said that the team had discussed how to deal with Rashid during the training camp but added that the Tigers want to keep it simple.

"Whenever we finish our batting in the nets, I speak to Mushfiqur [Rahim] or Tamim [Iqbal] and even after Sabbir [Rahman] and Mosaddek [Hossain] complete their batting we speak about how to face him [Rashid]. As we all know he is the number one T20I bowler but I think we also have to be aware of our strength and what type of cricket we play. You also need to know the opponents' strengths and weaknesses and on that basis we have to take calculated risks and bank on our strengths," said Mahmudullah.

According to the 32-year-old, Bangladesh are ahead in terms of experience in the batting and pace bowling departments and although Mahmudullah thought that the Tigers have managed to overcome questions about their ability in the shortest format of the game through their run to the Nidahas Trophy final, he added that they want to move up from there.