NEWS
Follow UsAhead of the second Test in Kanpur, Bangladesh’s head coach Chandika Hathurusinghe quashed all the rumours and reinstated that the 37-year-old Shakib Al Hasan would be available for selection.
Shakib was not his usual self in the first Test in Chennai, going wicketless with the ball in both innings and scoring 32 and 25 with the bat. But both batting coach David Hemp and Hathurusinghe reaffirmed that Shakib is actively involved in the practise session before the second Test.
"I haven't heard anything officially or any complaints (about Shakib)," he said. "There is no doubt about that at the moment. I haven't heard from my physio or from anyone. He's still eligible for selection."
Hathurusinghe also reckoned that the entire Bangladesh team could ‘perform better’ after their sheer disappointment in the Chennai Test.
"I'm not. I'm upset not about his performance but our overall performance, we could have done better. I'm sure that he also thinks that he can perform better. We all know what he's capable of. I think he batted really well in the second innings. He couldn't go on. Not because of lack of pride. It's sheer quality of the opposition,” Hathurasinghe said.
The Bangladesh head coach insisted that their selection wouldn’t be dependent on a ‘left-right’ combination. They would pick players more holistically.
"Just because of the left-handers, right-handers, is not the thing that we will take into consideration. If we are making a change, whether that batsman, whether Mahmudul Joy or whoever is coming in, what he can bring and who will miss out, and we look at it holistically like that, rather than left or right."
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