Bangladesh will go into the second One-Day International against New Zealand today hoping to seal a series victory after a thrilling 43-run win in Tuesday’s opener.
The win in the opener brought back the confidence that enabled the Tigers to complete an unprecedented 4-0 sweep in 2010. Tuesday’s win was their fifth in a row against New Zealand – a feat they could do perform against Zimbabwe and Kenya previously.
Bangladesh vice-captain Mahmudullah believes that going up 1-0 gave them the perfect boost in confidence and that the team is capable of staging another fairy tale performance similar to that earlier campaign.
‘Everyone is confident and Inshallah we will play positive cricket [on Thursday],’ said Mahmudullah.
The New Zealand side skipped their practice session on Wednesday to allow the players to recuperate from their defeat, but there was a completely different atmosphere in the Bangladesh dressing room, where they did not waste the opportunity for the last-minute fine-tuning.
‘We are not getting complacent,’ said Mahmudullah.
‘There is not a big difference in the New Zealand team, though they had quite a few new names in the squad, like Corey Anderson and Grant Elliot, who played very well yesterday.
‘They will come hard and we are taking preparation accordingly, and tomorrow we will try to play positive and aggressive cricket. They are a good side and we have to play to our best to win the match,’ he added.
Mahmudullah affirmed his faith in the winning combination and expressed satisfaction with all aspects of the game in the first ODI, apart from their batting power-play performance. The Tigers scored only 26 runs during the batting power-play and lost the wicket of skipper Mushfiqur Rahim.
‘The issue was raised in our discussion, but we are not thinking too much about it. Probably we could not execute the plan properly during the power-play. We will try to execute that next time.’
Spinner Abdur Razzak missed Wednesday’s training session because of stiffness in his back but is likely to be fit before the match. Bangladesh have already lost ace all-rounder Sakib al Hasan, who is out with dengue fever.
Team sources also said that selectors are considering replacing out-of-form opener Anamul Haque with all-rounder Ziaur Rahman in the playing XI. Zia would likely open the batting and provide an extra bowling option for Mushfiq in his efforts to replace Sakib’s lost overs.
-With New Age input
