Bangladesh begin maiden campaign Saturday

Bangladesh women’s team will make history before the first light of dawn breaks out in Bangladesh on Saturday as they will begin their maiden campaign in the ICC Women’s World Cup with a group phase match against South Africa. The match will begin at 4:00 am Bangladesh Standard Time at the University Oval in Dunedin. GTV will telecast the match live.
The Nigar Sultana-led team qualified for the 50-over World Cup for the first time in a somewhat fortunate way. The qualification event for the women’s tournament was held in Zimbabwe last year but it got cancelled midway due to worsening Covid-19 conditions in the region. Bangladesh, Pakistan and the West Indies earned qualification for the World Cup owing to their better position in the ICC rankings. Bangladesh are no strangers to the Women’s Twenty20 World Cups and have also emerged champions in the ACC Women’s Asia Cup once, hence them playing in the 50-over World Cup was a long time coming. Although Bangladesh lost both of their official warm-up games against England and Pakistan, they showed good fight with Sharmin Akhter and Fargana Hoque scoring splendid half-centuries in either of the games.