Conditioning Camp, Warm-ups and the World Cup

BanCricFan · #1 February 12, 2015, 04:30 AM

Salaam and a big hello to everyone! Nice to be back again, although, the mood here right now might not be so welcoming.

I thought I'll put a few things in perspective here. We all knew conditions in Down Under will be very different to that of subcontinent. But, seems like only a few actually understood what it really meant. Adjusting to bounce as opposed to low and slow bounce takes a lot of getting used to. Pace isn't such a huge issue here. In fact, many batters prefer pace and ball coming on to the bat. Bangladesh have not toured Aus/NZ for about EIGHT years - I think. Nor have we toured SA or England for a long time. So, these conditions should be very alien to most of Bangladesh batters.

BCB did well to organize the conditioning camp and the warm-up matches in Brisbane for two weeks. So, we have had about a month to adjust ourselves before our 1st official match. I will take that. These practice and warm-up matches are a mean to get to an end -which is to ready the boys for the MAIN matches in the tourney. They are not the end in itself. Of course, I would have loved to see a win. But, loses AT THIS STAGE might not be a bad thing, altogether. Because, it highlights the cracks or the chinks clearly and visibly. The Bangladesh think-tank will now have a much clearer idea as to what changes or adjustments need to be made.

And, as an armchair pundit, I can see where the most obvious works need to be done. It is the opening -particularly, Anamul. The right kind of start to the innings is extremely crucial. It sets the tone and momentum (or, the lack of it). We simply cannot afford an Anamul playing out 20 odd dot balls to open his account. It kills off the momentum right there and doesn't give much confidence to the batters to come. Just like that pacers are not afforded any "loosener" nowadays (although, our bowlers still bowls them), the openers are expected to set the tone and get on with it. I appreciate there are different conditions, two new balls, footwork and all. But, at no stage the SR should dip below the 50s -after the 5th over. Simple. Tamim should also rethink his approach. There must be a happy medium. Must rotate, must run quick 1s and 2s. I still have hope for young Anam. He will turn things around, In Sha Allah. But, he must find form against the Afghan boys...or. Momin doesn't bring me much confidence in the ODI. Shakib and Mushy must respond, urgently.

Taking all this into consideration, I still believe Bangladesh have enough talents and firepower to make it to the QF. As they go more into the tournament they will better adjust to the conditions and batsmen should fire.

Nadim · #2 February 12, 2015, 04:33 AM

Fully agree with you.

Ace of BD · #3 February 12, 2015, 04:35 AM

Right on the money. I have been the the most vocal on Anamul, but I think we'll get a clearer picture on feb 18 on how he responds and other members of the team as well who have struggled. Time will tell everything.

WarWolf · #4 February 12, 2015, 04:37 AM

Sensible OP.

Roni_uk · #5 February 12, 2015, 06:02 AM

#thereisHope

ma_o_mati · #6 February 12, 2015, 06:26 AM

If only others could think like you. Sigh. Great post

mufi_02 · #7 February 12, 2015, 10:24 AM

Hajot thika chara paise ashami. Welcome back BCF. Amader andolon shofol hoyeche.

Too long post. Didn't read the whole thing. But I know it's full of nuances.

simon · #8 February 12, 2015, 10:28 AM

I agree with BCF ji, oilcome back.

Vepu · #9 February 12, 2015, 12:03 PM

Right on the money as i expected from BCF. But both anamul and tam said multiple times to the media that their first target is to avoid a collapse in first 10 overs. Do you see it as a negative approach or is it the right approach considering every team is losing couple of early wickets.

Tiger444 · #10 February 12, 2015, 12:50 PM

The key, as always is the mental part. That's where the Afghanistan match will be the key game. We win, there's hope, we lose we're out. Plain and simple. If we get a win in any way, hopefully our players will get some confidence and there will be hope we can go 3-3.

As for our batting, If we continue to have Anamul, Mominul, Soumya as our 2/3, we'll struggle. As you say, these conditions are much different than ours. Hence, we will be heavily reliant on our senior batsmen. Whatever Anamul, Mominul, Shabbir, Soumya do should be considered a bonus. Thus, we need Mushy up at 3 for the millionth time. Having Anamul and Mominul together at the top will be the difference between a win and a loss. Have our 4 senior batsmen(Tamim, Mushy, Shakib, Riyad) bat through the innings and set up our innings and have the likes of Nasir and Shabbir come in and score whatever they can.

zman · #11 February 12, 2015, 01:00 PM

I think Afghan bowlers are fast and pretty accurate in the first 5/6 overs. Early conditions suit them very well. We need to preserve our wickets in the beginning. Focus should be on scoring in singles and putting away the occasional bad ball for four. Didn't like Anamul's approach though I felt he was being too conservative. After the initial period if they're not able to take wickets they'll get frustrated and start bowling wayward or at least give the batsmen more opportunities to score low risk runs.

Tiger444 · #12 February 12, 2015, 01:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by zman
I think Afghan bowlers are fast and pretty accurate in the first 5/6 overs. Early conditions suit them very well. We need to preserve our wickets in the beginning. Focus should be on scoring in singles and putting away the occasional bad ball for four. Didn't like Anamul's approach though I felt he was being too conservative. After the initial period if they're not able to take wickets they'll get frustrated and start bowling wayward or at least give the batsmen more opportunities to score low risk runs.

I'd rather have Soumya opening with the batting. Not giving up on Anamul, but he seems to really be lost out there and his batting will just end up losing all the momentum in the innings as it did yesterday. Soumya proves he can play his shots here and he might not have the big scores but if he can give some momentum in the innings by hitting some boundaries, that could be a bonus that we need. Tamim, Mushy, Riyad and Shakib need to carry the batting anyways and will be relied upon on the building process of our innings.

BanCricFan · #13 February 12, 2015, 01:24 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vepu
Right on the money as i expected from BCF. But both anamul and tam said multiple times to the media that their first target is to avoid a collapse in first 10 overs. Do you see it as a negative approach or is it the right approach considering every team is losing couple of early wickets.

Thank you, bhai Vepu. Collapse in the first 10 overs?? How many ODIs Tamim has played? Of course, its a rank idiotic approach. You don't have to go at 8 runs an over in the first 10 in Oz/NZ conditions. But, surely, 4 an over is entirely possible with 1s and 2s and occasional 4s. They need to rotate the strikes. Simply cannot afford to get bogged down and play out dot balls galore. First 5 overs could be used to get use to the bounce and pace. Still keep taking singles or, at least, look for them. Don't start offering dead bat to fulltosses and half-volleys. Common sense cricket. Really.

Anamul really need to come up with something in the Afg match. Otherwise, he should make away. Imrul will be sorely missed -I dread. Same applies for Mominul.

kalpurush · #14 February 12, 2015, 05:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BanCricFan

Taking all this into consideration, I still believe Bangladesh have enough talents and firepower to make it to the QF. As they go more into the tournament they will better adjust to the conditions and batsmen should fire.

Agreed.

What the openers need to figure out that they have to play according to the merit of the balls and exclude the premeditated shots. A good strategy is to play according to match situation.

Our batters, specially openers either keep playing shots or start playing test cricket as per pre-match decision! They fail or refuse to take the pitch condition into consideration.

affan_ayan · #15 February 12, 2015, 05:23 PM

"BCB did well to organize the conditioning camp and the warm-up matches in Brisbane for two weeks. So, we have had about a month to adjust ourselves before our 1st official match. I will take that. These practice and warm-up matches are a mean to get to an end -which is to ready the boys for the MAIN matches in the tourney. They are not the end in itself. Of course, I would have loved to see a win. But, loses AT THIS STAGE might not be a bad thing, altogether. Because, it highlights the cracks or the chinks clearly and visibly. The Bangladesh think-tank will now have a much clearer idea as to what changes or adjustments need to be made. "

- BCB did well what? This is expected of our team considering the unprofessional attitude remains in BCB. Here is some clue -
a. India sent their team to AUS quite sometime back and even they are struggling
b. Domestic league, like Atahar Ali Khan mentioned in one of the articles today, should have been made in similar conditions and organize 20-30 matches to find out the right player

I would say we need to be practical. If we have wins against Afg and Scot, we should ecstatic.

I found another unprofessional attitude from BCB, "Papon opts to go for 3 ODI with India than 1 test".
I am pretty sure thats what BCCI wanted. If our own BCB chairman shoots at foot, where should we go?

Rana Melb · #16 February 12, 2015, 05:31 PM

What I understood from a player their major concern is condition n inexperience to play at this stage. They have not accustomed with the conditions yet. 2/3 weeks are not enough.

Someone said BCB spent more than 3 crorer to organize the condition camp. If this is the case then why few players are not serious about this practice matches??

Holden · #17 February 12, 2015, 06:36 PM

I want to stay positive and believe we can make the quarters but in all honesty I think that these players don't have the skill set to play well in these foreign conditions. We saw how they were at home last World Cup, and even though we have some new players, most of these have never played in conditions like these against seasoned professionals. We have a very young team (youngest in the Tournament??) and I hope they will learn from the experience and take it to the next World Cup. I would be happy if they beat the associates and are competitive against the other Test playing nations.

Zeeshan · #18 February 12, 2015, 06:41 PM

If you censor every third word of OP a la Jimmy Kimmel Live, it makes an interesting read.

Ace of BD · #19 February 12, 2015, 08:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Holden
I want to stay positive and believe we can make the quarters but in all honesty I think that these players don't have the skill set to play well in these foreign conditions. We saw how they were at home last World Cup, and even though we have some new players, most of these have never played in conditions like these against seasoned professionals. We have a very young team (youngest in the Tournament??) and I hope they will learn from the experience and take it to the next World Cup. I would be happy if they beat the associates and are competitive against the other Test playing nations.

Funnier things have happened bro, keep faith. Check out Sandeep Patil's interview at cricinfo about 83 world cup, and how they were no-namers who were more interested in sight-seeing of England rather than even thinking of winning world cup. Or ask Inzi about how he didn't even have the strength to lift his bat against NZ in World Cup semi, when the writing was already on the wall for Pakistan. Or how down and out the sri lankans felt before 96 world cup when windies and aus aborted their matches.
The unprecedented events is what makes sports great unlike movies where the audience generally has a fair idea.
Joi amader hobei

Not wishful thinking. If you go by logic, it fails. These things cannot be described.

BanCricFan · #20 February 13, 2015, 03:30 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by affan_ayan

- BCB did well what? This is expected of our team considering the unprofessional attitude remains in BCB. Here is some clue -
a. India sent their team to AUS quite sometime back and even they are struggling
b. Domestic league, like Atahar Ali Khan mentioned in one of the articles today, should have been made in similar conditions and organize 20-30 matches to find out the right player

I would say we need to be practical. If we have wins against Afg and Scot, we should ecstatic.

I found another unprofessional attitude from BCB, "Papon opts to go for 3 ODI with India than 1 test".
I am pretty sure thats what BCCI wanted. If our own BCB chairman shoots at foot, where should we go?

Hello, affan_ayan! Always a pleasure to see you. Just wish you were a little more regular here. There was another knowledgeable poster mar_umpire (I think) appeared pretty much about the same time as you did. Wonder what happened to him!

On topic, I know what you mean. But, to be fair BCB hasn't done too badly here. Perhaps, they could have sent the A team/Academy to tour Aus or SA prior to the CWC. As for creating "similar conditions", not sure how feasible or practical that would have been. But sure they could have organized the DPL on green tops. I also had thought about it. But, this is BCB. The didn't even use kookaburra balls -let alone creating conditions! Playing 20 -30 matches after the Zim series would have been a major overkill. But 4/5 Green v Red practice matches on green tops would have gone a long way, though. They were right in not going to UAE or Sharjah. That wouldn't have helped anyway with the preparation.

As for as ODIs over one Test, I hope it is something to do with the ODI ranking race before the cut-off and not just the commercial interests. Still, they should play Test.