Feature

Bangladesh
Slumdog of cricket

Nishat

BANGLADESH is not yet a big name in the world of cricket. Bangladesh played its first one-day in 1986 (against Pakistan in Sri Lanka). At that time, Bangladesh could only play one-days if they played in a formal tournament (like the Asia Cup or the Australasia Cup). 11 yrs later, in 1997, BD became a full ICC member. 10 yrs after that Bangladesh qualified to the second round of the world Cup in West Indies. Interestingly after getting its test status in1998 Bangladesh cricket has shown good potential in one day internationals.

Although Bangladesh is still solidly at the bottom of the ICC rankings the team has reached a position that other big teams do not take them lightly. From the very beginning of 1998, the world had seen their progress. Sometime they have failed to prove themselves and made their supporter upset but when they proved they proved it in a very precise way and made everyone
applaud for them.

At early stages, when Bangladesh played big teams like India, Australia, South Africa, the matches used to be very much one-sided. At that time the supporters of Bangladesh cricket hoped that the team would demonstrate a better performance than the previous time but that was rare with some occasional upsets. This scenario has been changing gradually but surely with time as the team kept on improving its capacity. Now the supporters can anticipate wining every time Bangladesh plays; doesn't matter against whom.

In 2008 Bangladesh had a tri-series with India, involving Pakistan. That time no one had expected that Bangladesh would win a single match and all the excitement existed for the India versus Pakistan final. Again in 2009 Bangladesh had a tri-series with Sri-Lanka and Zimbabwe. In that series they reached the final but by going completely in different directions to everyone's anticipation by beating Sri-Lanka and getting beaten by Zimbabwe in the group round. Unfortunately they lost the final against Sri Lanka in spite of playing exceptionally well.

After upholding everyone's expectation in that series the hopes of all the Bangladeshis were elevated higher and with a promise of taking care of that, the team went to the ICC T20 World Cup. That was yet another disappointing event for the cricket lovers of the country as the team couldn't make anything up to the mark and came back crushing everyone's expectation by losing to both India and Ireland in the first round. Then again the BD cricket team beat both West Indies and Zimbabwe in away series in their respective home grounds and got their previous position back in everyone's heart. After that they again beat Zimbabwe in another one day series in national ground. But there is a need to mention that both the West Indies and Zimbabwe were the underdogs in these particular series as West Indies didn't have their regular national team players due to some problems with the board and Zimbabwe are not even a test playing nation. So wining against them was nothing but a very usual and expected outcome for Bangladesh.

Recently Bangladesh had another tri-nation series named Idea Cup Tri-Nation Series with India, and Sri Lanka in its own home ground. Although they couldn't even make a single win, the scenario of each match was a way lot different than the past. This time the team has come through everyone's expectation by giving the opponent a tough time despite the fact that they didn't win a single match.

The team has gradually gained experience, learned techniques and improved competency, and developed the competitive temperament. But still there is a long way to go. It is true that the team has the ability to win but it still hasn't had the ability to make the win a regular habit. But it's good news for Bangladeshi supporters that they are no longer an underdog as the team has grown to a point to be a challenging headache in the team meetings of the opposition camps. For now, let's just wish the team good luck and hope that the team sustains the development rate and continue to demonstrate consistent performance in the future.