Bangladesh will look to turn around their fortune in the last match of coach Jamie Siddons in charge in the third and final one-day international game against Australia on Tuesday.
The day-night game, which will begin at 2:00am and will be telecast by Neo Cricket and Bangladesh Television, will provide Bangladesh with a chance to end the series on a high after heavy defeats in the first two matches.
Siddons took over from compatriot Dav Watmore in November 2007 and has had reasonable success guiding Bangladesh to 31 wins in 83 matches he had been in charge so far.
His contract expires in June and the Bangladesh Cricket Board has decided not renew it after a low-key World Cup campaign and a poor Australia series.
Skipper Sakib al Hasan was disappointed with the way his team had performed in the series so far and was looking for a collective effort rather than one or two individual brilliance.
Bangladesh lost the first game by 60 runs before Shane Watson turned his bat into a blade to cut them into pieces with his world record 15 sixes in the second one-dayer on Monday.
But the home side can gain confidence from the fact the Mushfiqur Rahim and Shahriar Nafees struck two half-centuries in the second one-dayer to give them a respectable total batting first.
‘We thought that after the World Cup, we will start afresh and be competitive on our conditions but unfortunately we did not perform as a team,’ Sakib told New Age.
‘I think we need to be a more aggressive with bat. But that does not mean we have to play rash shots. We need to look for singles, two’s and boundaries all the time’ said Sakib.
‘Putting pressure on the Australian batsman with the new ball is also a very important aspect if we need to finish the series well,’ observed Sakib after Shane Watson had plundered a massive 185 off 96 balls in the second one-dayer.
‘It was one of those days that we had nothing to do,’ Sakib said of Watson’s performance which included the world record feat of 15 sixes.
‘I thought we did reasonably to post 229–7 after we were at one stage 88-5. Probably, the batsmen could have taken a bit more initiative early on but you cannot plan on what would happen next,’ said Sakib.
‘Shane Watson probably played the innings of his life and there was very little we could do,’ said Sakib.
Courtesy of NewAge
