Bangladesh 1 Chandika Hathurusingha 0

“It was a comprehensive victory for the Tigers. They buried the thoughts of former coach outsmarting them with his tactics and delivered the best in a commendable fashion”. 

 After a disastrous series in South Africa, the Bangladesh cricket fraternity was turned upside down when head coach Chandika Hathurusingha resigned from the post followed by a change of guard in test captaincy as Shakib Al Hasan was reappointed in place of Mushfiqur Rahim. Bangladesh remained without a coach with the new season looming large in the minds of Bangladesh cricket’s hierarchy. Bangladesh Cricket Board knocked the doors of various high profile coaches, but there was no positive reply from anyone.

In the meantime, Chandika took the responsibility of his team who were travelling through a tough time. Chandika felt, his country needs him in such a testing period and it’s always one of the best honours for anyone if he can deliver his country something best.  He set foot on Bangladesh soil to start his journey as the head coach of Sri Lanka and his opponents would be his former students, whom he nurtured and polished as one of the competitive customers in world cricket within two years of time.  

Chandika knows the strength and weakness of each and every Bangladesh player and there was a certain amount of fear in the minds of fans and critics, Chandika might exploit the weakness of this team at its maximum. But in fact, the story was different when Chandika’s men met against his old team in the third match of ongoing Tri-series in Bangladesh.

Sri Lanka’s start was not good in this Tri-series. They failed to overcome the Zimbabwe scare. In that match, they just lacked discipline and temperament and everyone thought, the Islanders would work on their shortcomings to bounce back in the much-awaited encounter against Bangladesh.   

But Sri Lanka remained the same as previous match.

Their bowling was below-par while the fielding was sloppy. The Lankan bowlers hardly could create an impact and leaked runs easily like they did against Zimbabwe.

Though Bangladesh did not mind facing such a below-par bowling and fielding unit. In front of their old teacher, they dominated the Lankan attack without showing any signs of sympathy. Tamim Iqbal was composed but Shakib Al Hasan, Mushfiqur Rahim, Mahmudullah Riyad and Sabbir Rahman smothered the Lankan bowlers with a rare disdain. Boundaries and sixes overflew at Mirpur on an absolute belter of a wicket.

The onslaught of Tigers halted at 320 for 7 – a total which was not a tough one to chase on such a wicket, but Sri Lanka made a mess of it.

In the last encounter against Zimbabwe, poor shot selection let down Sri Lanka and they repeated it again on Friday. The Lankan top order triggered the button of destruction themselves by executing rash strokes whereas, this track required a keep-the-basics-right type of approach and no rocket science.

They lost the cream of batting order in a quick succession and succumbed to a heavy defeat.

It was a comprehensive victory for the Tigers. They buried the thoughts of former coach outsmarting them with his tactics and delivered the best in a commendable fashion.  After the dominating victory against Zimbabwe, this ruthless display against their former coach’s men, only indicates the confidence among the boys and their hunger for success should guide them to achieve more.

Even though the dominance of Bangladesh was great to watch, but the disgraceful show of Sri Lanka was not at all satisfactory. Things won’t change for them within a week, but they would need time to make a comeback. Chandika is a very good coach. Sri Lanka need to give him enough time to bring back Sri Lanka on the right track.

Note: This article was published at Cricketsoccer on 19/01/2018 Bangladesh 1 Chandika Hathurusingha 0

Thank You

Faisal Caesar