Netherlands captain Peter Borren on Tuesday praised Bangladesh heavily for their recent show in the Asia Cup and hoped that the tournament will take its toll on the Tigers in their ICC World Twenty20 qualifier against his side. Beaten finalists in the Asia Cup, Bangladesh got hardly any time to recover before they were required to fly for Dharamsala to play the World Twenty qualifiers, where they are pitted against Netherlands, Ireland and Oman.
‘Obviously we watched and they were fantastic in the Asia Cup,’ Borren said ahead of their today’s opening match. And obviously well deserved finalists and played well in the final as well.
‘They’ve got some extremely talented cricketers and have been in good form. Not just now, for a while. During the last couple of years their results have been fantastic.
‘We have got to respect that at the same time, hopefully the Asia Cup has taken a bit out of them. It has been a rather quick turnaround for them and hopefully we can get them in a bit of it.
‘It’s pretty exciting to play a team at the top of their game at the moment.’
Borren felt it was unfair on Tigers to be required to play the qualifying round and took a swipe on the organisers for the format that made it extremely difficult for his team and other associates.
Netherlands qualified for the final round at the expense of Zimbabwe in the previous edition but was handed a tougher task this time with a tough qualifying group.
‘It’s obviously very difficult,’ said Borren. ‘I think every team that is playing in the first round or qualifier or whatever it is called knows that it is going to be very tough.
‘We were fortunate enough to sneak in 2014. But here first out of four teams is very difficult. You have to feel for all the teams probably.
‘And also feel for the likes of Bangladesh. They are playing Test cricket. They have to come back here to play and qualify.
‘I personally don’t see why this tournament [qualifying round] has to be. The main draw has to be ten teams but that’s what it is,’ he said.
Netherlands played against Bangladesh two Twenty20 internationals earlier and won one of them. However, Borren was taking little confidence from the matches played in their home in 2012.
Bangladesh have become completely a new outfit over the period, especially with the ball. Apart from skipper Mashrafee bin Murtaza, they never faced any of the Bangladesh’s pace bowlers, something that give Borren a serious concern.
‘We have watched a lot of videos,’ he said. ‘We have done our research. It has changed a lot…they have some serious seamers. Mustafur [Rahman] is nice and I watched him bowl.
‘Al Amin too is looking good. And include Sakib, they have a superb attack. We have to respect that and bank on the home work we have done,’ he said.
-With New Age input
