Bangladesh batsman Mominul Haque has his younger sister Momo to thank for giving him some extra motivation to get his fourth Test century in the third Test in Chittagong on Saturday. Mominul wanted to give her a gift on her birthday after the first Test in Dhaka – especially since he could not recall the date – and she said she wanted a century from him in the series.When Mominul steered Sikandar Raza for a third man boundary to complete his hundred, he rushed to his non-striking partner Sakib al Hasan and revealed the fact first.
Sakib hugged his junior partner who looked to be over the moon.
Mominul had never celebrated a century with such a broad smile.
‘I told him [Sakib] that a few days back it was my younger sister’s birthday and I asked her what she wanted. She said that she wanted a hundred,’ said Mominul.
The century also came as a kind of relief to Mominul, who got a start in almost every match but missed a big innings since his unbeaten 100 against Sri Lanka at the same ground.
Mominul scored at least four fifties since the hundred in February but could not convert them into century.
‘I was getting out in 50s a number of times, so I worked on that thought a bit and the way to go,’ said Mominul.
‘No technical work, but just few tactics. I was just thinking that okay this is where I am getting out, how do I change this.’
‘I don’t think a lot, just a bit,’ said Mominul, known as cool customer who hardly gets flustered by anything.
Pressure is something which Mominul has coped well with since his debut against Sri Lanka at Galle.
Mominul said he did not take any pressure on himself for losing his concentration after fifties, a common problem for many of his team-mates.
‘There was no extra pressure, I just tried to adjust,’ he said. ‘Actually, in the entire innings, I was a little less negative, maybe that was through the grace of God.’
His unbeaten 131 took his average to 63.03, the best since Don Bradman for batsman to play a minimum 20 innings. Mominul is now ahead of Graeme Pollock (60.97), George Headley (60.83) and Hubert Sutcliffe (60.73) on this count.
With his 11 fifty-plus innings in 12 Tests, Mominul also joined Everton Weekes, Sunil Gavaskar and Mark Taylor. In his brief career he failed to score a fifty only in his second Test in 2013 against Zimbabwe at Harare.
It also took him level with Simon Katich, Kumar Sangakkara, Jacque Kallis, Mathew Hayden, Alec Stewart and Everton Weekes, who all had at least one fifty in nine consecutive Tests.
Mominul once had described records as the ‘Hoax of Satan’ and the new records could do nothing to change his opinion.
‘When you get success then your expectations will increase, people will want more from you, the more you perform,’ said Mominul. ‘If I know that I am getting those records, if I get satisfied then that won’t be good. I don’t know what happens with others.’
-With New Age input
