BD International Cricket S32 Discussion

[saadiscool220]

Can't wait to see Vedanga's debut tomorrow!

[Zorax]

Gutting loss vs England today - just 6 runs short! Heartbreak. Will do a match report in the coming days.

Quite a long break till our next game, vs West Indies on Thursday, then a relatively shorter turnaround for our final group stage game on Saturday. At this point I don't think even 2 wins will get us through to the Semis. England and India are on 2 wins each and will play each other, so one of them takes out first spot. SA have 2 wins in the bank too, they play India and then us. So we need SA to lose both matches without a bonus point, and to take 5 points off West Indies, and maybe then we have a shot.

With only 2 games to go I'm not sure if we will make any changes to the squad. Will assess the conditions we'll be playing on closer to the day, and then evaluate if there is anyone from the Reserves / 'A' Team that could be brought in to make the squad stronger. Most likely we'll persist with the current squad, and likely field a similar playing XI to the first two game, with the bench strength being given a go if fitness/form demands it.

Can't wait to see Vedanga's debut tomorrow!

No debut for Vedanga unfortunately! But he's in contention - Raun's a bit low on fitness ATM and we've got a couple of bats that are short of runs, so we'll see if V can slot in at do a job for us in the next couple of games.

I do hope we get some 'Friendly' T20Is scheduled after this WC - I'd love a chance to give the bench strength some game time, and to test out a few different combinations.

[Zorax]

Match Report - Bangladesh vs England, T20I, 30 Oct 2022 @ Antarctica

Match ID: 1646608
State of Pitch: 84 Moisture, 13 wear, 100 speed
Weather: 7 wind, 14 cloud, 56 heat

Pre-Match Head to Head T20I Record: Played 9, Eng won 3, BD won 6

Toss: Bangladesh won the toss and elected to bowl
Result: England won by 6 runs

BD XI: H. Sattar, Z. Sheikh (+), R. Shkorer, R. Baksh, S. Sami, Q. Bhatti, G. Ghani, M. Obaid (*), T. Baloch, I. Jamil, M. Rahman
Eng XI: L. Clifford, Q. Verginix, R. Laurence, A. Smith, W. Plunkett, B. Alder, M. Boucher (+), A. Knapp, J. Sharpe (*), B. McKinnon, M. Small

BD T20I debuts: Qasim Bhatti
Eng T20I debuts: None

So close, but so far! A tough day out in the field was followed by being reduced to 15/3 in the chase, but a sensational innings by Sajid Sami and good cameos from Raun and Mubashar almost got us over the line! Alas we ran out of fire power at the death, and fell just 6 runs short of a great victory.

First onto the conditions and selections. A fast green wicket was exactly the sort of conditions Mustafizur Rahman was picked for, and he replaced Mirza Uzair in the starting XI. Baloch held his spot on the strength of his bowling effort in the first game, and due to generally having a slightly better skillset for T20 cricket. Qasim Bhatti came in for his T20 debut, slotting in at number 6 in place of Tin Yau. A good destructive bat and decent in the field, I wanted to try him out and see how he goes. Rest of the side unchanged from our first match.

We won the toss and naturally elected to bowl first. Ghani and Jamil took the new ball, and did well, extracting movement with control and conceding just 16 runs in the first 4 overs! But we needed early wickets. Clifford had gotten his eye in, and tore into our first bowling change, hitting Rahman for two boundaries and a six in the fifth over! But 'The Fizz' got the last laugh, getting Clifford to nick behind on the last ball! Laurence hit Obaid for 4 to end the powerplay, and England were off to a steady start at 41/1.

The Fizz bowled a tidy 7th over, and Baloch got tossed the ball for the 8th, but he was welcomed by Quintinius Verginix with 4-6-6 in his first three balls! Obaid picked up Lawrence next over, but Verginix kept up his assault. He brought up a 41 ball half-century with a six off Jamil in the 11th over, and continued to pick boundaries at will. At 16 overs England were looking ominous on 133/2 - Verginix having scored 80 of those.

We pulled it back slightly from there on in - Rahman got Smith, Obaid got Plunkett, and Ghani then got Verginix in successive overs. But Adler and Boucher kept the runs flowing, and England ended on 176/5. A very good score in any set of conditions. The seamers were good for us - Jamil an econ below 6, Ghani 1 wicket @ 7 RPO, and Rahman and Obaid taking 2 each - but Baloch had a poor day out, going for 51 with a BQ of 2.3. Perhaps we should have backed the wristspinner?

Ah well. First innings behind us, we now needed a strong start of our own if we wanted to chase this. Unfortunately that wasn't to be, as Zubair Sheikh was castled by McKinnon in the 2nd over! Sattar was bowled by Small next over, and Baksh got stranded in no man's land to be runout by Adler the over after that! 15/3 in 3.2 overs - disastrous start! Sajid Sami joined Raun Shkorer in the middle - two of our most experienced batters, with a big job on their shoulders.

Sami announced himself with a towering six on the third ball he faced, and a cracking boundary the following over. Raun kept knocking it about while Sami found the fence a couple more times, and at 9 overs we were 52/3. A recovery, but still a long way from victory, with the asking rate creeping up to 12 an over. England had just brought their wrist spinner into the attack -6 from his first over- and then tossed the ball to medium pacer Allen Knapp. With the match starting to slip away, the sensational Sajid Sami had sized up England's 4th and 5th bowlers, and sensed it was time to send them into the stands! Three 4s and three 6s followed in the next two balls, as Sami raced from 25 off 20 to 55 off 28! Raun carved out a boundary as well, and suddenly we had raced to 90/3 at 11 overs! The asking rate now an immensely manageable 9.67 - game on!

Sami and Shkorer kept the scoreboard ticking, with Sami dispatching another six and finding another boundary, bringing up their 100 partnership at the end of the 14th over! At this same point in their innings, England were 117/2 - just 2 runs ahead with 1 wicket more in hand. We needed 62 in the last 6 overs, and frankly this game was ours for the taking.

But this game had another twist in store. Bob Mckinnon, England's spearhead, returned for his final over, and picked up Sami (bowled) and Bhatti (caught behind for a golden duck on debut) in consecutive deliveries! Ghani negotiated the hattrick ball by hitting it for four - his first international runs - but fell to Jackie Sharpe the next over! The wheels were starting to come off. Skipper Mubashar Obaid joined Raun in the middle, and with 4 overs to go we still needed 50 runs.

Knapp returned for his 3rd over, got hit by Obaid for a boundary first ball, and then got taken for a four and six by Raun - who finally decided it was time to go up a gear. Alas, he went for one shot too many, and skied the next ball to be well caught at the boundary. The tail was exposed, with 34 needed in 3. Clifford bowled a tidy over and picked up Baloch's wicket to boot, but Obaid took Knapp's final over for 18 runs, keeping us in the game with 10 to win off the last over!

Alas, Obaid was not able to keep strike for that over. Yes-no-yes-no...a single turned down on the final ball of the 19th meant Jamil had strike, and England's wristspinner proved too good to get away. Two dots and bowled, 10 needed off 3 with our number 11 in. The Fizz got a single, but Obaid could only manage 1 off the penultimate ball of the game. 9 to win in one ball, Clifford kept his foot behind the line and bowled it straight, the three runs taken from Rahman's hoick only served to buff our NRR slightly. England pick up the win in a great game.

What could we have done better? Maybe we could have backed Mirza Uzair, given how well Clifford bowled and how poorly Baloch went. His batting might have been useful too. Our top order failing to fire hurt too - you can't win many games after being 15/3 in 3.3 overs, tho we gave it a mighty good go! We also dropped two catches in the final over, which might have cost us a few crucial runs. But overall I think we did lots of things right. We pushed England right to the final over, and that's despite being out-rated handily and in every single department.

Positives - Sajid Sami's brilliant innings, Raun's supporting role and Obaid having a good day out with both bat and ball. Our seamers bowled well overall, and despite the loss we took a bonus point from the game - which might be crucial.

Fitness Updates - Raun and Sami both a bit tired, but with a long break till the next game they both should be fit and raring to go.

[Zorax]

Apologies for the late match report! Bit under the weather and swamped with work. It's up there now.

Following on from this game, I made another change to the squad. The pitch for today's game vs SA seems to suit medium pacers, and while we did have Riaz Khan in the squad for just these conditions, he was in pretty poor touch the day before the match, and so I felt it was worth calling Mushtaq Khattak up from the reserves just for this game. He's a very talented bowler too and in great touch as well.

A great move in the end Absolutely clinical performance with ball and bat from the boys today, and 5 points in the kitty. Match report for this coming up soon!

[Zorax]

Match Report - Bangladesh vs South Africa, T20I, 03 Nov 2022 @ Real Deva CG

Match ID: 1646612
State of Pitch: 65 Moisture, 48 wear, 65 speed
Weather: 20 wind, 70 cloud, 67 heat

Pre-Match Head to Head T20I Record: Played 9, SA won 2, BD won 7

Toss: Bangladesh won the toss and elected to bowl
Result: Bangladesh won by 8 wickets

BD XI: H. Sattar, Z. Sheikh (+), R. Shkorer, R. Baksh, S. Sami, N. Shams, G. Ghani, M. Obaid (*), M. Uzair, M. Khattak, I. Jamil
SA XI: I. Hyde, W. Torquil, U. Fouche (*), M. Mncwabe, E. De Kock, H. Kruger (+), J. Bezuidenhout, L. De Kock, J. Christopher, K. Luvuno, T. Schmidt

BD T20I debuts: Naveed Shams, Mushtaq Khattak
SA T20I debuts: Louis De Kock

What a result! I wish I could take more credit for some genius tactics that lead to this outcome, but frankly this was just one of those days where everything went our way. We needed 5 points from this game to keep Semi Final qualification hopes alive, and we've got them in some style!

So let's talk selection. Riaz Khan has every right to feel hard-done by - he was in the squad for just these conditions! Bit of grass, bit of cloud cover, but not too much pace. He's a specialist swing bowled who would have done great in the Power Play. Alas, he's not been bowling that well in the Nat squad nets, so the SOS call went out to Mushtaq Khattak, pulling him out of the reserves and into the squad to make his T20I debut! Apart from that, it was Naveed Shams' turn to get a go at number 6, while Mirza Uzair returned in place of Tauseef Baloch as frontline spinner. The rest of the side picked itself.

Onto the toss, and we've had great luck with these this season. Obaid is three of three this World Cup, and opted to field first. Easy move given the moisture and cloud cover. The ratings had South Africa as clear favourites - we out-rated them in our middle order, fielding was dead even, but they out-rated us in every other department and overall.

Jamil and Ghani took the new ball, as usual, and Ghani struck early, trapping Torquil LBW in the 2nd over! Next over, the debutant Khattak drops a dolly at the fence that goes for four - an inauspicious start to his International career, and a reprive for Ian Hyde. Hyde and Fouche rode that momentum, taking South Africa to solid 48/1 at the powerplay, and 65/1 after 8 overs. A great start for the batting side, and we needed a bit of magic to get back into this game.

Enter Mirza Uzair! The wily veteran bounced back strongly from his omission last game, deceiving Hyde to rattle his stumps for our 2nd wicket! Skipper Mubashar Obaid went one further the following over, dismissing skipper Fouche and veteran Eugene de Kock in the space of 4 balls! SA now 73/4 in 10 overs, and we had clawed our way back into the innings!

Mncwabe and Kruger recovered with a mini-partnership of 24 runs (Mncwabe scoring 19 of them), and at 91/4 in 12 overs the match was balanced once more. What happened next was chaos. Khattak returned for his third over, and picked up his maiden international wicket when Mncwabe holed out to Shkorer in the deep. Ghani bowled the following over, and took 2 in 2 balls, sending back Kruger and Louis de Kock (what is it with debutants and golden ducks this WC?) both bowled! Christopher came in, hit Uzair for a six, and was bowled two balls later as well! Luvuno dragged Obaid onto his stumps the following over, and Khattak cleaned up Schmidt 6 balls later! An incredible collapse - 6 wickets for 23 runs in 24 balls! Our bowling was decent, but some poor shot selection aided us massively. SA all out for 120 in 16.5 overs - massively under par given the conditions.

Haroon Sattar got us off to a great start, stroking Luvuno for three consecutive boundaries in the 2nd over. Zubair Sheikh's poor run as opener continued, as he edged a slog behind for 3 off 6. Raun Shkorer strode out to the middle, and batted with all of the confidence of a man in form. Together Sattar and Shkorer added 69 chanceless runs in 49 balls, breaking the back of the chase. Sattar brought up his fifty off 29 balls with a gorgeous shot off a 149kmph delivery from Schmidt, but was bowled by a slower ball later that over. Ramzan Baksh joined Raun in the middle, and helped finish off a comfortable chase. Raun brought up his own fifty off 40 balls, and a ball later the game was done! It had taken us just 14.4 overs to register our first win of the S32 World Cup!

A hard game to analyse this. We bowled well, but SA's average ball quality suggests that they bowled better. They just had an awful day out with the bat, and that can happen to any side. We were clinical in the chase, offering no chances and taking the 5 points on offer. Hard to pick any flaws from this win, we'll celebrate the success but also keep in mind like days like this won't come often!

Positives - Wickets for everyone (except Jamil), fifties for Haroon and Raun. A win and 5 points, what more could a coach ask for?

Fitness Updates - Raun is exhausted, and might actually struggle to play on Sunday. Would be quite a blow as he's been such a key batter for us. No other concerns apart from that.

[Zorax]

One change made to the squad ahead of tomorrow's game vs West Indies

19 year old prodigy Arshad Pasha has been called up straight from the 'A' Squad into the main side, replacing Nasir Qasim as the third spin option in the team!

The reasons for this are simple. Arshad's skill have improved rapidly since he first appeared on our radar, and is now comfortably one of the Top 3 Deshi spinners going around. He adds a bit of batting ability too, and is in great touch. It would be harsh to deny him a spot in the side given his age. He's an exciting prospect and hopefully this will the start of a long and glorious career for BD!

Nasir is unlucky to be dropped without getting a chance to play a game. However, much like Riaz Khan, he does have a long future ahead of him

[Zorax]

Disappointing end to the campaign. West Indies basically did what I wanted to do - bat first, go hard, pile on a big score, and get the bonus point. Fair play to them, they've been aggressive throughout the tournament and it paid off for them here. 70k lower order suggests they really took batting deep to heart!

Will do a proper report and debrief on our season in due course. Hard to read a lot into 4 T20Is. We were outrated in every game, took one thumping, got one upset win, and pushed two other strong teams very close. 3 bonus points and a win from 4 games is not a bad all considered. Hopefully we'll get some friendlies organised against the teams from the other group so we can test a few things out and get some more game time into the squad!

I am looking to name a BD U19 squad by the end of the month! Have started the scouting process. If you have any players age 19 or under that you believe deserve to be in consideration, please do let me know!

[Dileep]

We played match one agenda - to have fun as we were out already and picked more part timers to bowl and built batting till the last infact used previous 3 games openers at 8/9/10

Unfortunately you were at the receiving end at one of the most aggressive batting displayed in stumped Nats

You pulled us back to 190 pretty well frankly and i thought you might even chase as we had very poor bowling lineup

[Zorax]

Match Report - Bangladesh vs West Indies, T20I, 05 Nov 2022 @ SaMuRai XI CG

Match ID: 1646614
State of Pitch: 40 Moisture, 42 wear, 62 speed
Weather: 4 wind, 18 cloud, 33 heat

Pre-Match Head to Head T20I Record: Played 10, WI won 4, BD won 5, 1 Tie

Toss: West Indies won the toss and elected to bat
Result: West Indies won by 43 runs

BD XI: H. Sattar, S. Sami, R. Baksh, V. Yeshonath, T. Yau, Z. Sheikh (+), G. Ghani, M. Obaid (*), A.Pasha, M. Uzair, I. Jamil
WI XI: H. Fowler, O. Foot, M. Hayter (+), O. Cousins, S. Byers (*), D. Felton, S. Wicks, S. Hawes, O. Kenton, T. Davies, C. McMahon

BD T20I debuts: Arshad Pasha, Vedanga Yeshonath
WI T20I debuts: Steve Byers, Chris McMahon

Ah well. A thumping loss to end our run. I don't think we did much wrong, and we have some positives to take, we were just on the receiving end of something special from the West Indies. Such is the nature of T20 cricket. Let's dissect.

First the playing XI. Wonderkid Arshad Pasha slotted into the XI to make his debut on a mostly flat wicket some wear. His addition into the bowling attack meant we had 2 spinners and 3 seamers with batting down till 9 (10 if you count Uzair). So a positive addition overall. Raun Shkorer was not fit enough for this game so unfortunately missed out, which meant Vedanga Yeshonath got a debut as well. He slotted in at 4, with Ramzan taking Raun's slot at 3. Tin Yau returned to the middle order to add some experience, and hopefully pull off a run-out with his Bullet Arm. The final change was sending Sajid Sami up to open. He's been batting well and Zubair Sheikh has not clicked in that role, so a swap was in order. Zubair would bat at 6 instead.

The pre-match ratings were revealing, and as Dileep (WI Nat manager) himself reveals, the West Indies really stacked their batting! All 20 overs to be bowled by part timers and all rounders, with a beefy 70k tail to supplement a 78k top order and 68k middle order. Yikes. It seems both of us came with the same plan - bat first, bat big, and bundle the opposition out with scoreboard pressure. Except the West Indies really committed to it. We needed 5 points from this game to make the semi finals, West Indies were out to make a statement. With all to play for, Obaid lost the toss and we were sent in to field first.

What unfolded was one of the most destructive batting performances in Stumped T20I history. Fowler set the tone with 3 consecutive boundaries to end the first over, and even tho Ghani got Foot first ball, Fowler and Hayter tore into us to take 82 runs off the PowerPlay! Yikes. Pasha got taken for 16 runs in the first 5 balls of his international career, but got Hayter on his last ball.

Cousins joined Fowler and the attack continued. They brought WI's 100 up in the 8th over, Fowler his fifty off 22 balls. Pasha broke this partnership for his 2nd wicket, Jamil got the debutant Byers a few overs later, and Pasha then nabbed Pelton for a duck. 144/5 in 12 overs could have still ended very badly for us, but we stuck to our guns and kept on taking wickets. WI's long batting lineup kept coming after us, Cousins brought up his fifty in 29 balls, and we dropped a few hard catches in the deep. But thanfully they gave us enough chances that we were able to bowl them out inside 18 overs...for the small matter of 191 runs! Yikes again. What a bizarre innings, but full credit to WI"s tactics. It came off and we were stuck with an imposing target for the win, let alone the bonus point. The put into perspective what the West Indies did - they either attacked or slogged every single delivery bowled in the innings except for one! Absolute madness. Arshad Pasha was the pick of our bowlers, taking 4/33 in his 4 overs, while Jamil took 3 and Ghani 2.

Unfortunately our chase did not go as well. Sajid Sami hit a bright 53 off 35 balls, Tin Yau looked good for 33 off 24, but no one else could get going. We lost 3 wickets in the powerplay, and ultimately scratched our way to 148/9 after our 20 overs. The West Indies bowled better than their ratings suggest, backed by plenty of scoreboard pressure and a wearing deck. Debutant Chris McMahon took 3/17 in his 4 overs, and Arshad Pasha wrapped up a solid international debut with 12* off 7.

Looking back on the result, I don't think we did much wrong tactically. It was just the West Indies' day, right from the toss down to the execution with bat and bowl. Had we won the toss we would have batted first too, and there's very little we could have done to prepare for the West Indies' coming out all guns blazing. On another day we bowl them out cheaply and chase it down. Such is the nature of the beast. South Africa get into the Semi Final with 10 points, while we finish last on 7.

Positives - Arshad Pasha with a terrific debut. He's got a huge future ahead of him. Sajid Sami was good with the bat, wickets for Ghani and Jamil and Tin Yau with a solid knock too.

Fitness Updates - Doesn't really matter. That's the end of our campaign! The Finals are on Sunday, and hopefully we get some Friendly games in after that!

[Zorax]

Our schedule of Friendly Matches has been released!

17 Nov 2022 - 08:00 - Bangladesh v Zimbabwe - Lauderdale CG
20 Nov 2022 - 01:00 - Bangladesh v New Zealand - Stop Making Sense CG
24 Nov 2022 - 15:00 - Bangladesh v Sri Lanka - Honest Hunks CG
27 Nov 2022 - 10:00 - Bangladesh v Pakistan - Schmaltzberg Mining Inc Stadium
01 Dec 2022 - 05:00 - Bangladesh v Australia - BozoJR CG

Should be good fun Plenty of strong teams in here. The focus will be on winning games, but also a bit of experimentation and planning for the next WT20!