Bangladesh suffered a huge blow before the second Test against South Africa as their star opener Tamim Iqbal was deemed unfit for the game due to an injury that he aggravated during the first Test.
The left-handed batsman pulled his muscles during the three-day practice match at Benoni and was not in best of his physical condition in the first Test at Potchefstroom.Tamim made only 39 runs in the first innings when he could not open for Bangladesh for the first time in his Test career due to the nursing the same thigh injury.
He spent 49 minutes in the dressing room before South Africa’s surprise declaration and as a result had to bat at number five. He suffered a duck in the second innings.
A grade-1 tear in his left thigh was revealed in a scan after the first Test at Potchefstroom, said a team source, which indicated that his injured left thigh had been covered by fluid after tearing it to a good extent.
According to physicians as grade-1 usually takes four weeks to recover and it made him also uncertain for three subsequent one-day internationals and two Twenty20 internationals.
The management decided to keep him without perusing the option of sending him home.
The Bangladesh Cricket Board president Nazmul Hasan was not sure about his injury type but he revealed that his chance of playing in the second Test is very little.
‘I don’t think so,’ Nazmul, who often claimed to play a key role in team selection, said about the prospect of Tamim’s playing in the second Test when his attention was drawn on Wednesday.
‘I think it really depends on him. There is no specific injury found in the scan. But only he can tell exactly what he suffered. We have two more days. But I think there is only slight chance of his playing,’ Nazmul said in Dhaka.
Bangladesh team started their South Africa tour without their major player Sakib al Hasan who took a sabbatical from the Test cricket.
The Tigers suffered a huge defeat of 333 runs in the first Test and the loss of Tamim in the second Test was expected to be a massive blow, especially at a time when their other opening batsman Soumya Sarkar was also struggling with his fitness.
Soumya Sarkar missed the first Test due to a shoulder injury but could make a return for the second Test to take the place of Tamim should he pass the fitness Test.
If Tamim did not play this would be Bangladesh’s first Test without the iconic duo Tamim and Sakib since March 2013 when the Tigers earned a creditable draw against Sri Lanka at Galle.
-With New Age input
