Bangladesh skipper Sakib al Hasan was pleased to see his side ending the year 2010 on a high after 14 consecutive defeats at home and away in the first seven months.
The Tigers played some brilliant cricket in the first few months against some strong opponents but still had to wait until their England tour in July for their first win of the year.
The narrow five-run win at Bristol with which they completed the circle of beating all Test-playing countries, however, was also quickly overshadowed by their defeats against Ireland and lowly Netherlands in the following matches.
They erased the sad memory in the best way they could do by humiliating New Zealand 4-0 at home which gave them their first series sweep against a full-strength top opposition in October.
Their winning run came to an abrupt end with a nine-run defeat to Zimbabwe in the first match of the just-concluded series, but they bounced back quite spectacularly to take the series 3-1.
The six-wicket victory over Zimbabwe in the final one-dayer on Sunday took their tally to nine wins in the year, making it the third successful calendar year in their history.
They had won 17 matches in 2006 and 14 matches in 2009, but this time they had relatively a far tougher ride facing India and Sri Lanka in the tri-nation tournament before hosting India and England and touring New Zealand in the first six months.
They toured England, Ireland and Scotland before hosting New Zealand and Zimbabwe in the next half of the year and finally reaped the reward for their hard work.
‘We really played very good cricket in this year. It’s true that we could not win against big sides at the start of the year, but we were always on an upward curve and it paid dividends at the end,’ said Sakib.
‘We still have enough room for improvement. But team-wise and individually we really passed a great year,’ said Sakib, who took highest 46 wickets in the year and cannot be overtaken by any other bowler in the remaining days with the existing fixtures.
Bangladesh had three cricketers among the top five most successful bowlers of the year after Shafiul Islam claimed third highest 32 wickets and Abdur Razzak took fifth highest 29, something which Sakib believes indicated a bright future for the side.
Paceman Mashrafee bin Murtaza claimed 49 wickets in 2006 and that was the only time a Bangladeshi player had topped the year-ending chart in any category.
Most of Bangladesh’s wins in 2006 came against inferior sides like Zimbabwe, Kenya and Scotland, but they had a clear impact on the World Cup in the following year.
Sakib hoped to repeat the feat in the upcoming World Cup as well.
‘We played 13-14 matches in a row against Zimbabwe before the World Cup 2007 and we won most of them. It helped us in the World Cup. We are also playing good cricket now and it gives us some confidence which I think will spur us on in the World Cup,’ said Sakib.
