After a woeful World Cup journey Bangladesh will start their two-match Test series from today against New Zealand when they will have to play with some younsters in absence of some of the frontline cricketers.
The match will start at 9:30 at the Sylhet Cricket Stadium.
Might be it would be a huge setback for the Tigers when they will going to face off another tough challenge with a bunch of young bloods who are almost rookie in the elite format of cricket.
It’s not hard to imagine that how much challenging it would be for the Tigers when they will have to face off New Zealand without five of their experienced and vital performers.
It would be more than tough for the new look Bangladesh to handle both the batting and the bowling sides of Kiwis led by Kane Williamson and Tim Southee respectively. The batting unit of the Black Caps contains Tom Latham, Devon Conway, Kyle Jamieson and Henry Nicholls when Daryl Mitchell and Rachin Ravindra, will be bristling with confidence after their overwhelming performances in the World Cup.
The bowling order will be led by the captain Tim Southee when Ish Sodhi, Mitchell Santner, Ajaz Patel Ravindra's all-round skills, Neil Wagner will back him.
Tigers will miss half of their regular members when the captain and ace all-rounder Shakib Al Hassan, experienced openers Tamim Iqbal and Litton Das Shakib that would left a big holes in the batting line-up. In the bowling line-up, pace spearhead Taskin Ahmed and his fast bowling partner Ebadot Hossain and Mustafizur Rahman are absent for different issues.
The players are absent due to different excuses when, Shakib Al Hassan are contesting in the national election and he had also a finger injury, Taskin and Ebadot are also rule out for injury, when Litton Das is on leave to have some beautiful times with his family, as his wife gave a child.
On the other hands, in absent of Shakib, the left-handed batsman Nazmul Hossain Shanto will make his debut as Test captain, so in all respects, Bangladesh are going to play New Zealand with most of inexperienced players in the team.
It might be a Bangladesh transition period for Bangladesh Test cricket, as the Tigers’ head coach Hathuru Singha also termed the situation as a time of changeover. As the Sri Lankan said that Bangladesh have to reduce the dependency of seniors, they should be habituate to play in absence of the senior players, however Hathuru also said it very exciting to play the Test with the team comprised with newcomers.
But the Sri Lanka coach did not explained how tough it would be to face the team like New Zealand with the novices to whom Bangladesh lost all nine Test series they played when they won only one Test match and could manage three draws out of 17 matches where there were eight innings defeats.
New Zealand, who sent their second string team for the ODI series against Bangladesh in September and won the by 2-0, but for Test series they came with their best team led by Tim Southee.
However, Bangladesh will play Test after five months and New Zealand will play their first Test in eight months while for both it is the kick-off in the World Test Championship.
Shadman Islam, Najmul Hossain Shanto (c), Mushfiqur Rahim, Mahmudul Hasan Joy, Nurul Hasan (wk), Mehidy Hasan Miraz, Shahadat Hossain, Hasan Mahmud, Shoriful Islam, Taijul Islam, Khaled Ahmed, Mominul Haque, Hasan Murad, and Nayeem Hasan.
