Shakib Al Hasan pointed to his team’s death-overs struggles and extras on the field as two major worries after a loss to Sri Lanka on September 1 in Dubai ended Bangladesh’s Asia Cup 2022 campaign from Group B.
The skipper wasn’t pleased by his team delivering 8 wides and 4 no-balls in a close-fought thriller, where the Bangla Tigers suffered yet another failure in overs 16-20 to lose despite posting a score of 183/7 batting first.
Falling under his scrutiny the most were the pair of no-balls that off-spinner Mahedi Hasan delivered, including one when Sri Lanka closed out the proceedings with 3 needed off 2 balls.
Speaking to the press after the loss, Shakib wasn’t excessively critical of Hasan, who he says has done well domestically and needs to be backed. But took offence to the no-balls, stating he believes it is criminal for a spinner to bowl them.
“He (Mehidy Hasan) has done well in domestic cricket. He did well under pressure. No one likes their team bowling no balls. Spinners bowling no balls is a crime. We bowled a lot of no balls and wides. I think we were under pressure. We need to work on it for the world cup. We are looking to improve gradually,”
Shakib said, per ESPNcricinfo.
He expressed genuine worry over Bangladesh’s death-overs struggles with the ball, calling for his pacers to improve their options in the end phase where two games in a row they failed to maintain any leash on run-scoring.
With the T20 World Cup in Australia in mind, the premier allrounder said Bangladesh’s death bowling needs immediate improvement if they are to make their presence felt at the ICC event.
“In the back-end of the innings, we did not bowl well, but we batted really well. If we can improve our last five overs of bowling, then a lot of things will get better,”
said Shakib after Bangladesh backed their horror 16-20 overs outing versus Afghanistan with another insipid performance against Sri Lanka.
