Low confidence, some mental blocks and the poor form of some performing players combined to bring about a series defeat for Bangladesh against Sri Lanka, skipper Musfiqur Rahim said after his side went down by 61 runs in the second one-day international on Thursday.
Bangladesh repeated their catching miseries to present Sri Lanka with dozens of additional runs before the batsmen played one shot too many to throw their wickets away, resulting in the massive defeat.
At least four catches went down, three of them at crucial stages, which helped the Islanders recover from 63-3 to pile up 289-6, a huge improvement from their batting display in the previous match.
Nasir Hossain dropped a straight forward catch from Ashan Priyanjan off Sohag Gazi after the batsman had just arrived at the crease. Bangladesh paid dearly for giving him a life on 2 as Priyanjan went on to add 114 with Kumar Sangakkara for the fourth wicket.
As if that was not enough, Mahmudullah grassed Angelo Mathews on 39, a drop that later appeared to be a game-changer. Mathews and Sangakkara added 83 runs in a little over nine overs, which took the game out of Bangladesh’s reach.
Mominul Haque, usually a safe catcher, gave Kithuruwan Vithanage two lives, which may not have contributed that much to the Sri Lankan total but certainly psychologically affected the Tigers.
‘I think in critical times we have made too many mistakes,’ Mushfiq said in the post-match press conference. ‘[This is] the biggest thing that has happened in the last two ODIs. In moments when one can’t make any mistakes and when you don’t expect these sorts of mistakes from certain players, that’s when these things happen.’
‘If you do so many mistakes, it’s difficult to win against any team.’
‘We probably tried to be a bit cautious,’ said Mushfiq. ‘We are thinking that we won’t do mistakes, and then it happens. From that aspect, there is a bit of a mental block because, the way we lost the last three games, it might make any team mentally weak.’
‘We never lost three matches on a row like this. So from that side, [we are] mentally a bit affected. Some of the players are not able to perform consistently. This is a mixture of this, that’s why we are playing cautiously and hence the mistakes are taking place,’ he said.
Mushfiq defended the team selection, which included Mahmudullah, the completely out-of-sorts all-rounder who has allegedly transmitted a negative vibe among all his team-mates with his callous approach and low confidence.
Naeem Islam, Bangladesh’s highest run-getter in the previous series against New Zealand, was tipped to replace Mahmudullah, whose poor body language appeared to be contagious.
Mushfiq, who is engaged to Mahmudullah’s sister-in-law, said that Naeem is not an ideal replacement for him and that he also does not want to drop a player after one or two bad performances.
‘Naeem generally bats at number five, and at number five we have Sakib [al Hasan]. At number seven we need an all-rounder, where we are trying, whoever plays, [Sohag] Gazi or Riyad Bhai [ Mahmudullah], to get an according input.’
‘Immediately dropping a player without giving him another chance is something that I am not for as a Bangladesh captain,’ said Mushfiq.
‘Even if someone goes through a bad patch, I will try to back him. If a player thinks that if he plays badly, today he is out of form, it won’t be good for him.’
-With New Age input
