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No real surprises in Bangladesh's T20 World Cup squad
NEWS
Follow UsOut-of-form batter Soumya Sarkar has been retained, while Rubel Hossain has been named in the reserves
Bangladesh have named a strong 15-man squad for the upcoming 2021 T20 World Cup in the UAE and Oman. There were no real surprises as all these 15 players recently featured in the T20I series against New Zealand.
Bangladesh had 19 players in the squad for the T20I series against New Zealand and Rubel Hossain, Aminul Islam Mosaddek Hossein and Taijul Islam are the ones who have been left out of the main squad. The former two have still been named in the reserves.
Soumya Sarkar has struggled with the bat of late but the left-hander managed to retain his spot in the absence of Tamim Iqbal, who made himself unavailable for the T20 World Cup. The 28-year-old only managed 28 runs in five games against Australia and is yet to feature in the five-match series against New Zealand. Meanwhile, Tamim was the top run-scorer (295 at 73.75) for Bangladesh in the 2016 edition.
Bangladesh have been in superb form in the shortest format of the game. They defeated Zimbabwe 2-1 earlier this year and then smashed Australia 4-1 at home. There's still one T20I left against New Zealand but Bangladesh have already sealed the series 3-1.
The experienced trio of Shakib Al Hasan, Mushfiqur Rahim and Mahmudullah will give them solidity in the batting department. Bangladesh also gave a well-balanced bowling attack, with the likes of Mustafizur Rahman, Taskin Ahmed, Mahedi Hasan, Nasum Ahmed and Shakib all in pretty good form.
Bangladesh will have to secure a top-two finish in Group B to qualify for the Super 12 stage. Oman, Papua New Guinea and Scotland are the other three teams in that qualifying group. Bangladesh will start their campaign against Scotland on October 17 in Al Amerat. They will then play Oman on October 19 and PNG on October 21.
Squad: Mahmudullah (c), Shakib Al Hasan, Mushfiqur Rahim, Soumya Sarkar, Liton Das (wk), Afif Hossain, Mohammad Naim, Nurul Hasan Sohan, Shamim Hossain, Mustafizur Rahman, Taskin Ahmed, Mohammad Saifuddin, Shoriful Islam, Mahedi Hasan, Nasum Ahmed.
Reserves: Aminul Islam, Rubel Hossain.