Pace bowler Robiul Islam took the opportunity to grab the center stage for proving his mettle in the third day of the first Test match against Zimbabwe as his six-wicket haul presented some much needed light in the Tigers camp at Harare on Friday.
Though it is too early to say whether Bangladesh can save this match or not but surely the performance of Robiul of 6-55 brought the team back from the depths of despair after the failure of the batsmen put their backs against the wall.
Robiul, who looked lively in the first innings as well, looked to enjoy the conditions in Zimbabwe as he exploited it to the maximum by continuously troubling the opponent batsmen by mixing his deliveries, largely depending on swing.
It must have frustrated the Bangladesh team management for not choosing another pace bowler in the line-up despite having left-arm pace bowler Sajidul Islam in their ranks as a natural swing bowler.
Robiul, a hard-working pace bowler from Satkhira looked to have developed himself in the recent times and managed to perform reasonably well in Test matches though never hogging the spotlight like many of his teammates.
But it did not take long for lady luck to smile upon him considering the tremendous amount of patience and perseverance that he had accumulated in his career and proved his worth in only his fifth Test match after debuting against England three years ago as a budding 23-year old.
Robiul did not manage to get a team in the second edition of the cash-rich Bangladesh Premier League but he chose not to grumble at his exclusion.
Rather than getting bogged down, he took it as a
challenge and went through a month-long training camp under the supervision of National Cricket Academy head coach Richard McInnes to sharpen his skills.
Robiul went to Sri Lanka on the back of a relatively successful campaign in the National Cricket League where he picked up 27 wickets but he was not considered for the first Test against the Island nation.
He was a surprise inclusion in the second Test as he was chosen in place of spinner Elias Sunny but when he finally entered the field in the second Test match at Colombo, he was back in business picking up two wickets in each innings that hardly supported the fact that it was his first competitive game in three months.
Robiul became the third Bangladeshi pace bowler to claim six wickets in Test cricket after Shahadat Hossain and the late Manzarul Islam, who grabbed six wickets against South Africa and Zimbabwe respectively.
Though Shahadat took it against a stronger opponent but it can surely be debated whether it was the best performance by a Bangladeshi bowler in Test cricket.
-With New Age input
