CricDigs Blogs

Hardcore fans of the Bangladeshi cricket team might want to disagree with this but the fact remains that Bangladesh are a highly depleted squad right now. As it is, the side wasn’t winning much against other international sides and its status was being constantly questioned by foreign teams who didn’t see much purpose in playing test cricket with them. This problem has been recently compounded with many of its national team members defecting to the much-maligned ICL. However, when it comes to playing against Zimbabwe (matched in terms of experience at least) it does make for some good cricket viewing for those who might be a bit bored by seeing the regular big names of the game pelting the ball out of the ground.

Zimbabwe find themselves at home in the current triangular one-day series when playing against Bangladesh. The pitches on offer here are slow and offer plenty of opportunities for the slowish pace bowling of its bowlers. Sri Lanka is a certainty for the finals and it is good to see that a triangular series that encourages some worthwhile competition for the lesser known teams has been organised. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to include teams like Scotland in the future.

As it turned out, Zimbabwe did manage to score a somewhat ‘surprising’ win over Bangladesh. But I am not too sure why would people rate Bangladesh notches above the Zimbabwe team. Agreed, the African team seems very pedestrian at times but then again Bangladesh hasn’t done much to credit their reputation as an international side despite having much more talent and experience on display. I certainly hope more of such tournaments are organised where the viewership and immediate financial returns aren’t as lucrative but it certainly helps the process of developing more competitive sides in the near future.

Such sort of short cricketing tournaments with one big international side and two struggling opponents with just one round robin matches to qualify for the finals helps in encouraging healthy competition for the lesser teams. Also, it gives them the opportunity of rubbing shoulders with the big names without developing a feeling of not belonging to the international cricketing arena.