The Super League phase of Dhaka Premier League will start at different venues today with all participating clubs eyeing to begin it on a positive note. With only three points differentiating the six teams each and every game will be crunch for the battle of gaining the supremacy of most prestigious domestic cricket tournament. Table leaders Victoria Sporting Club will take on reigning champions Prime Bank at Fatullah while Abahani Limited will face Prime Doleshwar at BKSP.
In the other match of the day, Mohammedan Sporting Club will start their Super League campaign against Legends of Rupganj to open the last phase of the highly controversial league.
Victoria will be eyeing to continue their dominance in the traditional 50-over tournament that helped them to be at top in the points table.
‘I think Super League is a different ball game because you don’t have enough chance to make a comeback,’ said Victoria batsman Mominul Haque.
‘We have played some good cricket and want to continue playing in the same manner,’ said one of the prominent Test batsmen of Bangladesh national side.
On the other hand, Prime Bank will try to grab the opportunity by demonstrating aggressive brand of cricket that they failed to show despite having two of country’s best attacking batsmen Sabbir Rahman and Kazi Nurul Hasan.
‘I am sure they will prove their worth as they failed to do justice to their potential in the first phase,’ said Prime coach Abdul Karim.
‘We are sure to make our presence felt in this phase and confident of winning the tournament,’ he said.
This edition of DPL is marred with several controversies as club officials as well as players frequently complained against umpiring.
Abahani Limited had been at the centre stage for most of the controversies as many alleged that the powerful club, which have many BCB high-ups in their hierarchy, managed to dictate terms over the Cricket Committee of Dhaka Metropolis.
MSC officials, who claimed that Abahani used their muscle power of CCDM, had already asked CCDM to change the venue of their match against their arch-rivals that is scheduled to be held at BKSP. The venue has hosted most of the matches of the Dhanmondi-based club so far.
However, MSC coach Sohel Islam is not interested to look that far and seemed to concern on the job at hand and winning the opening game and set the tone.
‘Winning the opening game always helps because you pick up the momentum,’ said Sohel.
‘We had both high and lows in the league so far and now we are focusing on brining some kind of consistency,’ he said.
Legends are hoping they could maintain their 100 per cent winning record in the SBNS as they earlier defeated Abahani in their only match at SBNS.
‘I think it will be our day and Soumya [Sarkar] will start from where he left off,’ said Legends coach Khaled Mashud about the national team opener.
‘I think he knows SBNS and how it behaves being a national player,’ said Mashud.
‘That is why he succeeded against Abahani and it will be the same,’ added the former Bangladesh captain.
In the other match Abahani will take on Prime Dholeshwar, who are ready to give a fitting reply of their first phase loss that had been subject of high-scale controversy.
-With New Age input
