I think we'll see good leadership side of Shakib, says Bangladesh coach Siddons

Bangladesh head coach Jamie Siddons said that Shakib will have to play Test cricket regularly in order to lead the side for a longer period of time ahead of the team's tour of West Indies.

Shakib was reappointed Bangladesh's Test captain this week after Mominul Haque stepped down from the role. However, there are still doubts over the star allrounder's participation in Bangladesh's Test series for a long period. The southpaw had missed majority of their red-ball cricket in the last three years.

"Well if he's (Shakib) going to captain, he needs to play. It's pretty hard to captain if he's not there," Siddon said in a press-conference in Dhaka on Saturday.

"I think he is excited about the prospect of being captain again and I think we'll see a really good leadership side of Shakib that may have been missing for a little while," he added.

Siddons also felt the former skipper Mominul can now focus on his batting.

"I think there are two positives. Shakib's a very good captain and a very good thinker of the game. He's also a consistent performer. He'll do a very good job as captain. Everyone follows him, so he'll be great leader. The other thing is good thing is now Mominul can focus on his batting, he's been struggling a little bit but now he can focus a 100% on his batting," Siddons said.

Siddons also denied the speculation of Tamim Iqbal played at no.4 as he insisted that the veteran lefthander will continue as the opener.

"In most countries, the senior players do get the opportunity to bat down the order if they've opened for a long time. Tamim would love that but we need to find another opening batter first. We can't just push someone who is not performing in domestic cricket or hasn't performed for our A-team or the Tigers. So that's the challenge for us, to find an opening batter if we allow Tamim to go down to four. I think he'll be a fantastic number four."