Everyone’s fear about Bangladesh become true, they have lost the second T20 of three-match Bangladesh Airlines T20 series at Dehradun and lost the series as well. They didn’t just lose, what they do is helplessly surrendered to the Afghans. In fact, the word surrender makes the credit of Afghans little lower. Basically, the Afghans’ strong spin attack forced Bangladesh to surrender.
Bangladesh won the toss and elected to bat first. Maybe the Bengal batsmen do not want to face the pressure of the Afghan spinners when they play with the target. But the result was same as the last one. Bangladesh’s batting against the Afghan spin remained the same as it was in the first match. Bangladesh has lost series while the Afghans won the second T20 by 6 wickets, and now there is fear of Whitewash for the Bangladesh Tigers.
World number one T20 bowler leg-spinner Rashid Khan was at the center of all the discussions before the start of the series. Bangladesh took preparations to handle it, and there was nothing to gain from it. It was quite clear in the first two matches, Rashid Khan’s bowling figures and Bangladeshi batsmen’s performance shows it all.
While Rashid Khan was in the center of all discussions, another mystery spinner Mujib ur Rahman has taken advantage of that as well. However, this Mujib also raised a lot of interest in playing the IPL, but who would have thought that he will make the Bangladeshi batsmen powerless during the power-play. Anyone’s thinking doesn’t matter anymore, because this has become the reality for the Bangladesh team.
Except this two, there is another experienced off-spinner Mohammad Nabi. In fact, this all-rounder Nabi is making things hard for the Bangladeshis in both the batting and bowling perspective.
That was about Afghanistan bowling, but what is the reason that the Bangladeshi bowling line-up without Mustafiz has become too ordinary for Afghan batsmen? In the two matches, Bangladesh’s bowling in the first 15-overs was quite controlled, but suddenly they forgot how to bowl in the slog overs! Forget about Inexplicable Abu Zayed or Abul Hasan, but well experienced Rubel Hossain? The mystery behind Rubel’s nothing bowling at the deaths is still remained as ordinary.
Many might say that captain Shakib has failed to change the bowling appropriately. Yes, it was right that he could have use bowlers like Mahmullah or Mosaddek in a regular basis, but it is Rubel, Zayed and Abul’s job to restrict opponents total at the end of the innings. And even Afghans are suffering from spin quite a bit, then why Bangladesh is not going for the spinner Allrounder Mehdi Hassan Miraz?
And that’s true that the Afghan spinners were too good, but doesn’t the Bangladeshi batsmen have the experience of playing spin at the international level? So why the team management and the players are not playing to play Rashid and Mujib with at least 4/5 runs in over instead of attacking them with risky shots? Isn’t it Shakib, Mushfiq, Liton’s desperate shot selections are making Rashid Khan’s job easier?
Apart from the senior four batsmen, the role of the rest of the batsmen in the side still remains unclear. Because of each match, they are playing in different positions, but it doesn’t make any difference for the team.
After too many mysteries and questions, it is time to see whether Bangladesh can avoid the shame of being the whitewash by winning the last match or not. However, the betting bid is not indicative of anything like this. The odds for a victory for Afghans are 1.8 while the rate for Bangladesh is 2.00.