It is an opportunity of the life time for the Tigers of Bangladesh to try and hurt African Lion further in cricket as the teams are poised to appear against each other in last encounter of the short series at Dhaka Thursday.

Rain is expected to interrupt the proceedings. But, if nature permits play for most of 15 sessions there may be a fascinating contest between the usually unmatched dual of the number 1 and number 9 ICC ranked teams. Brave Bangladeshis cricketers have already proved that “history does not always repeat itself”.

After winning the ODI series 2-1 margin they dominated most part of the rain ruined first test match. Experts believe that there is no reason why the ever growing in confidence Bangladesh cannot prove competitive yet again in the Dhaka test if they appear with “horses for the courses” team and play to the potentials.

Mushfiqur, the proud captain of Bangladesh has expressed his confidence in his mates announcing that “he has faith in his charges beating the tourist in Dhaka test”. The senior professional in the team Tamim Iqbal mentioned that each member of the team is hungry for success.

Bangladesh and South Africa have so far played 10 tests. Bangladesh lost one but all excepting the last test in Chittagong. Eight of the nine losses were by a margin of an innings. Even prior to the start of the last test very few experts and analysts found much opportunity to put up any contest against the vastly superior opposition.

The South African bowling attack featured three of the ten top ranked bowlers of world cricket – Dale Steyn, Morne Morkel and Vernon Philander.  Although they were a little depleted in their batting strength with the absence of great AB de Villiers, who was relieved from his duty for the birth of his first child, yet they had several world class performers like Hashim Amla, F du Plessis, JP Duminy, Q de Kock. There were huge differences in class, experience between the two sides. Not to talk about a series South Africa never lost even a test against Bangladesh considered a minnow in test cricket till now. South Africans did not lose a test series in the sub-continent since 2006.

But Bangladesh were well on course for rewriting the history in  Chittagong after dominating the proceedings over most part of the three of five days cricket was possible. Bowling first they teased, tormented and embarrassed a shell shocked South African team as Boy Wonder Mustafizur Rahman delivered yet another “Vini Vici Vidi” in debut in the “best” format of the game. He created world record of being the first ever player in the history of the game winning the man of match honor on debut in ODI and test. This honor he won against top teams like India and South Africa. With him in the arsenal and all his bowling mates glittering with supreme confidence Bangladesh looks well prepared for another pitched battle in their home of cricket. How much of cricket will be possible is any body’s guess in the high noon of Bangladesh monsoon. But if cricket is played over significant portion a very tight contest is in view.

There are discussions about retaining the same team which appeared in Chittagong. But there are some suggestions of adding the brilliant all-rounder Nasir Hossain replacing Taijul or Mohammad Shahid. While I find some justifications in including Nasir in place of Taijul I cannot suggest replacing the work horse Shahid. He looked very impressive in Chittagong test. It was his poor luck that he was not among the wicket takers. He did everything else correctly short of getting wickets. He bowled very accurately over longer period drying out runs which greatly assisted Mustafiz and mates in destroying Proteas batting from the other end. Shahid must play at Dhaka. The presence of Nasir may not alter the bowling strength that much as he is now these days a very confident off-spinner in addition to his more than useful late order batting. We know how brilliant he is in his fielding.

We found few suggestions for inclusion of Soumya Sarkar. He is a revelation all right. We also believe that there are more than even chance of him striking gold if given opportunity but it is also a stark reality that there is no room for him getting into the settled batting order. He has to wait a little longer for his opportunity which may not be too long into future.

Few suggested replacing either Kayes or Mominul with Soumya. How can one so easily forget Tamim Kayes Chittagong test heroics against Pakistan in the not too distant past? Kayes was even looking good in the only innings against South Africa. Only insane people can talk about replacing the most consistent test batsman when they talk about dropping Mominul. The first seven Bangladesh batsmen now are automatic choices. There may be talks whether Liton can bat higher in the batting order above Mushfiqur at number five. He look so impressive in his second test innings against fiery South African fast bowling attack with the second new ball. No one will ever dream of dropping Mahmudullah or Mushfiqur at this moment.

My suggested team for Dhaka test would be

Tamim Iqbal, Imrul Kayes, Mominul Haq, Mahmudullah Riyad, Mushfiqur Rahim, Shakib Al Hasan, Liton K Das, Nasir Hossain, Mohammad Shahid, Jubair Hossain and Mustafizur Rahman.

BDST: 0837 HRS, JULY 30, 2015
SR