SL vs BAN 2018: Mahmudullah Urges Batsmen to Step Up their Game

What’s the Story?

When a side fails to go past 150-run mark on a surface that has yielded 170 plus totals five times in the last four T20Is, the captain tends to go into introspection mode.

But, that’s not the case with Mahmudullah, who has opted to stay away from overthinking about the nature of wickets.

Bangladesh managed only 139/8 again India at the R. Premadasa Stadium and eventually lost the match by six wickets.

Batsmen to blame

Mahmudullah has urged his men to think about the upcoming game against the host rather than analysing the loss which they suffered at the hands of India.

“The wicket was good; I thought it was a 170-180 wicket. Our batsmen failed, I don’t have any doubts about the surface. We got chances, but we couldn’t put them to use. We need to think ahead of our opponents, but as of today, I think we as batsmen failed that on a good wicket like this, we floundered,” the Bangladesh captain had said after the loss.

20-25 runs short

The fast bowling unit which features the promising likes of Taskin Ahmed, Rubel Hossain and Mustafizur Rahman also felt that extra 25-30 runs would have given them a cushion while defending.

“I think we were 25-30 runs short yesterday. It would have been a different story. It is a good wicket, so chasing 170-180 isn’t that hard,” Taskin said ahead of a must-win clash against hosts Sri Lanka.

“Batting and bowling hasn’t been combining well for us, in recent times. We have to make this a consistent affair.”

“Recently we had a week-long camp for the fast bowlers, under Courtney Walsh. Champaka Ramanayake was also helping us. Rubel, myself and the other fast bowlers had different training and gameplan. Fizz [Mustafizur] was in [at] the PSL, so he is in good shape too. We hope that our output will be good in the next matches,” the 22-year-old pacer noted.

It won’t be wrong to say Bangladesh in a must-win situation considering there is minimal scope to commit error after having already lost their opening game.

A loss would put them in a sticky situation which would involve luck and NRR.

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