Bangladesh to face New Zealand in must win tri-series game
Bangladesh are keen to hit back into winning way and in doing so stay alive in the tri-nation series when they take on hosts New Zealand at Hagley Oval in Christchurch on Wednesday.
The match which starts at 8 am (Bangladesh time) will be aired live on private television channel Gazi TV and T Sports.
Bangladesh are in the completely back foot after losing their first two matches at the hands of Pakistan and New Zealand. While they remain win-less so far, both Pakistan and New Zealand won two matches in three and have already moved clearly to confirm the final.
But mathematically, Bangladesh still have the chance even though their road to confirming final will be extremely tougher. They not only have to win both of their return leg matches against New Zealand and Pakistan but also need to improve their run rate, which is so poor following their abysmal batting performance in the first two matches.
Bangladesh lost their first game to Pakistan by 21 runs when they were in good position to win the game. But they were restricted to 146-8, chasing the target of just 168.
Against New Zealand, they again came up with vulnerable batting show to be held back to 137-8, which New Zealand gunned down with ease to win the game by eight wickets.
While both of the teams beat Bangladesh, they won just one game against each other with Pakistan winning the first game against New Zealand by six wickets while New Zealand today crushed Pakistan by nine wickets.
Going by the form, Bangladesh actually had little to hope when they face off New Zealand again. But Bangladesh's technical consultant Sridharan Sriram still hopes against the hopes, saying that even though there is no result to show, Bangladesh actually are moving on the right track.
"I request all the supporters and media stay by our side. It is a matter of the country, a matter of everyone's emotions. I can confirm, the boys are trying their best to bring glory to the country. One of our values in this team is to make Bangladesh proud and bring victory to the fans," Sriram said in a video message sent by the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) today.
"I want to be patient. We have got a basic squad who will do well in the future. We are also waiting for the World Cup. We will get the answer to everything, we will fix the team. The brand of cricket we will play, we will definitely make Bangladesh proud."
But the history and record against the Kiwis is not in Bangladesh's favour. The stat showed that Bangladesh won just three matches in 16 encounters against the Black Caps in this format but they lost all of the eight T20 matches they played on New Zealand backyard.
Bangladesh were win-less on New Zealand soil until their historical Test win here in the early of this year. This is the fact that still could make them motivated to end their win-draught in T20 cricket here.
Overall Bangladesh played 137 T20 Internationals and while they won 47 matches, they had lost 87 matches. Three other matches ended in no result.
Bangladesh: Shakib Al Hasan (captain), Nurul Hasan (vc, wk), Nasum Ahmed, Taskin Ahmed, Yasir Ali, Liton Das (wk), Mehidy Hasan Miraz, Afif Hossain, Ebadot Hossain, Mosaddek Hossain, Hasan Mahmud, Mustafizur Rahman, Sabbir Rahman, Mohammad Saifuddin, Najmul Hossain Shanto.
New Zealand: Kane Williamson (captain), Finn Allen, Martin Guptill, Mark Champman, Dane Cleaver, Michael Bracewell, Devon Conway, Glenn Phillips, James Neesham, Ish Sodhi, Blair Tickner, Tim Southee, Trent Boult, Adam Milne.
Source: BSS
