Bangladesh Braces for the Unpredictable Challenges of the T20 World Series

Bangladesh head coach Chandika Hathutusingha on Friday said that his side are trying to prepare as well as they can for the upcoming edition of the T20 World Series as numerous factors are still unknown. The decision to add some more grass on the surface in the Sylhet International Cricket Stadium in the ongoing three-match T20I series is mostly due to unforeseeable factors, specifically in the United States.

Bangladesh are scheduled to play Sri Lanka in Dallas on June 7 and then South Africa on June 10 whereas the next two games of the group stage will be played in West Indies. 

"What we are looking at is the combination for the World Series, how the individuals fit in and understand the game plan and be comfortable. The other thing I mentioned is that we want to play on good wickets because we don't know what we get in America and we play two very important games in America and nobody has any clue because there is not much data behind it," 

Haturusingha told the press ahead of the series decider at the SICS on Friday. 

“What I understand is that New York has a drop-in wicket prepared in Adelaide and they are going to drop in there. Hopefully the expectation is something similar to what Australian pitches are. There's little feedback from NSW Cricket about Dallas. Washington Freedom played there. I spoke to their GM when I was in Australia. Our recollection from St Vincent is the last Test we played there," he said.

“So we are preparing as well as we can for these unknown factors," he said, adding that playing on good tracks is also assisting their bowlers in changing their usual plan and adapting in terms they are now learning to both with a different approach altogether.  

"One thing we realised is that we are playing in different kind of pitches now and in this series there is more grass and more carry and we want to play on wickets that are conducive to high scoring to get us understand what is acceptable and what areas we need to improve in bowling because it's a mindset shift as well because when you are bowling on certain wickets 150 as a winning score. You expect to bowl in a certain way and if you bowl in these sort of pitches you are going at eight runs an over it is very good. 160 you saw the other day was not a par score and even 200 after losing four wickets in power play we nearly got there and we really need to understand those factors as well so I am pretty pleased with the way our bowling unit is shaping up," he said.

Ahead of the last T20I, Hathurusingha said that he is delighted with the way his side bounced back from the defeat in the series opener. “You are talking about the last game. I thought we almost played a perfect game. Pleasing thing for me is how we quickly learnt from the first game," he said.

He further added that both Litton Das and Soumya Sarkar both accepted that they committed mistakes in the first match but learned from their mistakes and came back strongly in the next game stitching together a 63 run stand. “Both of them put their hands up after the first game that their approach was wrong and they will work on it and played good cricket. I am old enough to understand that people make mistakes. Look at the start we got, 63 [in Powerplay]. T20 is amazing. As long as they are playing for the team and contributing for the team, that's what we want.”

Chandika also said that he is happy with the performance of Jaker Ali and Mahmudullah while Shoriful Islam over the years has become their strike bowler.  "He( Mahmudullah) brings a lot of experience. He played the Bangladesh T20 League with a lot of maturity. He is playing with a lot of freedom which I said in a previous interview. When I saw him in the World Series, he was so much at-ease with his game and himself. He is playing beautifully now.

"It is very refreshing to see what he (Jaker) can do. I only saw him in this Bangladesh T20 League. He is very calm which is really nice to see. It is one quality you need from someone who bats at No 5, 6 or 7. Most of the time you have to do certain things with limited time. It was really pleasing to see what he can do. It gave us a lot of confidence as a team.

"We know that he (Shoriful) had a very good Bangladesh T20 League and I think he came up with the same confidence to bowl in these matches as well. What happened was in the first game due to dew, the ball didn't swing as it did in the Bangladesh T20 League and he had to adjust very quickly for the second game so that was very pleasing to see the way he bowled in the second game. Every game he is growing into a leading bowler for us with Taskin and Fizz there is another one we can bank on."