Stewardship Over Stardom: Why Aminul Islam’s Leadership Could Redefine Bangladesh Cricket

For much of Bangladesh cricket’s modern history, leadership has oscillated between administrative power and political influence. Rarely has it been shaped by deep cricketing literacy combined with institutional experience. The rise of Aminul Islam as President of the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) represents a potentially transformative shift, not simply because of who he is, but because of what he represents.

At a time when Bangladesh cricket is navigating both global power politics and domestic structural fragility, Aminul’s leadership offers something the board has historically lacked: credibility across dressing rooms, governance corridors, and international cricket diplomacy.

This is not nostalgia for a former player. It is a case study in why technically informed leadership matters in modern sport governance.

From Pioneer to Rebuilder: The Symbolism Matters

Aminul Islam belongs to the generation that built Bangladesh cricket when it barely existed. In an era when football dominated national imagination and cricket funding was almost nonexistent, players like him carried the sport on passion alone.

His Test century in Bangladesh’s inaugural Test was not just a statistical milestone, it was psychological nation-building. It told a young cricket nation that it belonged at the highest level.

That historical legitimacy now translates into administrative capital. Unlike many career administrators, Aminul understands the emotional economy of Bangladesh cricket — the fragile relationship between expectation, pressure, and identity.

And in a country where cricket is not just sport but national expression, that matters.

The Administrator Who Understands Systems, Not Just Scorecards

Perhaps the strongest argument for Aminul’s presidency is his systemic worldview.

His diagnosis of Bangladesh cricket’s long-standing weaknesses is brutally honest:

• No consistent selection philosophy

• Weak domestic-to-international transition pipeline

• Decades-long stagnation in advanced coaching education

• Dhaka-centric administrative power concentration

• Poor first-class infrastructure and wicket quality

Rather than chasing short-term ranking targets, his focus on ecosystem rebuilding signals strategic maturity. Modern cricket success is not produced by talent alone, it is produced by systems that allow talent to mature.

The launch of Level-3 coaching programs after nearly two decades of absence is not headline news. But it is the kind of reform that changes national team performance five to ten years later.

That is long-term governance thinking, something Bangladesh cricket has historically struggled to sustain.

The “Triple Century” Vision: A Governance Charter, Not a Slogan

The Triple Century Programme represents perhaps the first attempt to create a unified philosophical roadmap for Bangladesh cricket.

Its pillars, protecting the spirit of the game, performance excellence, national cricket connectivity, and institutional modernization, are less about branding and more about structural alignment.

The most radical component is decentralization.

For decades, Bangladesh cricket functioned as a Dhaka command economy. Talent identification, selection influence, league structures, all radiated from a single administrative center.

Aminul’s push to create divisional cricket leadership, regional selection pathways, and local cricket offices is not just administrative reform. It is democratization of cricket opportunity.

In cricketing terms, decentralization means survival.

Moral Authority in a Politicized Cricket Environment

One of the most striking aspects of Aminul’s presidency is personal sacrifice. By openly stating he draws no salary and is funding parts of his own travel, he is reframing the moral psychology of cricket administration.

In a system historically criticized for patronage networks, that symbolic break matters.

It creates narrative contrast: Not power for privilege.

Power for stewardship.

In sports governance, perception often drives institutional trust as much as policy.

The Diplomatic Operator: The 2026 Crisis as Leadership Test

The T20 World Cup crisis may ultimately be remembered as the first major stress test of his presidency.

Reports suggest Bangladesh moved from potential sanctions territory to:

• Zero penalties

• Preserved ICC revenue share

• Secured future ICC event hosting window

• Expanded international match hosting opportunities

More importantly, Bangladesh positioned itself as a stabilizing diplomatic actor rather than a reactive participant.

Aminul’s international exposure through ICC and ACC appears to have translated into negotiation literacy, understanding how global cricket power actually functions beyond public statements.

This is modern cricket geopolitics: quiet leverage, not loud confrontation.

Restoring Cricket Culture: The Soft Power Battle

Perhaps his most underrated focus is cultural restoration.

His repeated concern that domestic achievements and emerging players are ignored by media signals a deeper worry: Bangladesh is losing its cricket narrative identity.

If fans only engage with controversy and not cricketing excellence, talent pathways eventually weaken.

Reviving cricket culture, school cricket, madrasa cricket, district leagues, club participation is not nostalgia. It is pipeline security.

Every major cricket nation that declined structurally first lost its grassroots competitive culture.

The Risk: Long-Term Vision vs Short-Term Public Patience

The greatest challenge Aminqul faces is not structural. It is psychological.

Bangladesh cricket culture is conditioned toward immediate performance validation. But systemic rebuilds rarely show visible success inside one election cycle.

If his governance model survives the pressure of short-term results politics, Bangladesh cricket could emerge structurally stronger by the early 2030s.

If not, the cycle of partial reform and reset will continue.

The Strategic Significance: Why This Presidency Matters Beyond Bangladesh

If successful, Aminul’s model could become a blueprint for mid-tier cricket nations:

- Former elite player

- Global governance experience

- Systems-first reform strategy

- Moral credibility narrative

- Regional diplomatic awareness

- That combination is rare in global cricket administration.

The Verdict: Leadership as Trust, Not Authority

Aminul Islam’s greatest strength may not be policy, diplomacy, or cricketing pedigree individually.

It is trust.

Trust from players, because he has lived their reality.

Trust from international bodies , because he speaks governance language.

Trust from fans, because he represents cricket before power.

Bangladesh cricket does not just need modernization.

It needs legitimacy in how modernization happens.

If his reforms take root, Aminul Islam may not just be remembered as Bangladesh’s first Test centurion.

He may be remembered as the architect of Bangladesh cricket’s second founding.

Thank You 

Faisal Caesar 

The South Asian Pivot: How Bangladesh and Pakistan Outmaneuvered Cricket’s Power Axis

For nearly two decades, global cricket’s power map has been drawn along a predictable axis: India for money, Dubai for governance. The financial dominance of India’s cricket economy, combined with the ICC’s structural dependence on Indian broadcast revenue, has created an ecosystem where most boards operate within quiet constraints. Compliance has often been safer than confrontation.

But the fallout from the 2026 T20 World Cup standoff may mark the first credible disruption of that order. In what increasingly looks like a calculated geopolitical play rather than a reactive boycott, Bangladesh and Pakistan demonstrated that financial power is not the same as strategic leverage.

This was not just resistance. It was maneuver warfare.

The “No-Penalty” Doctrine: Bangladesh’s Strategic Breakthrough

Bangladesh’s refusal to travel to India could, under traditional ICC logic, have triggered a cascade of punishment, fines, funding cuts, or even temporary isolation from ICC revenue pools. Instead, something unprecedented happened: nothing.

- No fines.

- No administrative sanctions.

Full tournament payments despite non-participation.

That outcome matters far beyond one tournament. It establishes a soft but powerful precedent, that sovereign or security-linked decisions can override purely commercial participation obligations.

The Bangladesh Cricket Board did not simply avoid punishment; it reshaped the language of enforcement. By pushing the ICC toward “facilitative support” rather than disciplinary action, Bangladesh effectively carved out a diplomatic escape hatch for member boards operating under government directives.

In a sport where commercial commitments have often trumped political realities, this was a structural shift.

Pakistan’s Financial Checkmate

If Bangladesh created the opening, Pakistan executed the decisive move.

By quietly linking their participation, especially in the India–Pakistan fixture, to Bangladesh’s treatment, Pakistan forced the ICC to confront an uncomfortable truth: the global tournament economy is not built only on Indian cricket. It is built on Indian rivalries.

The India–Pakistan match is not just another game. It is the tournament’s financial spine. Remove it, and the broadcast model fractures.

The estimated threat, roughly ₹2000 crore in projected losses, was not theoretical. Broadcasters, sponsors, and advertisers structure entire campaign cycles around that single fixture.

Pakistan understood something crucial:

Power in cricket is not only about who generates the most money.

It is about who can withdraw the most money from the system.

That is leverage. And it worked.

The symbolic image of senior ICC leadership travelling to Lahore to negotiate signaled something deeper than crisis management. It suggested recognition, however reluctant, that Pakistan remains a central power broker when it chooses to assert itself.

Turning Exclusion into Strategic Gain: The Hosting Dividend

Perhaps the most tangible outcome of this standoff is the reported commitment to allocate Bangladesh a standalone ICC event before the 2031 ODI World Cup cycle.

If this holds, it represents a quiet institutional bypass of the traditional bidding hierarchy. Normally, hosting rights are fought over through multi-year lobbying, infrastructure audits, and political negotiation.

Bangladesh appears to have achieved through leverage what others pursue through process.

From a strategic standpoint, hosting rights are not just about matches. They are about:

• Stadium modernization

• Government investment flows

• Tourism branding

• Long-term integration into global scheduling priority

In effect, Bangladesh converted short-term exclusion into long-term structural inclusion.

That is textbook strategic negotiation.

The Rise of South Asian Bloc Politics in Cricket

The most overlooked element of this episode is regional coordination.

With Pakistan applying financial pressure and Sri Lanka playing mediator, the dispute briefly resembled a coordinated South Asian negotiating bloc. Historically, South Asian cricket has been fragmented by bilateral tensions and competing economic interests.

This time, history, including memories of regional solidarity moments like the 1996 World Cup, appears to have been leveraged as diplomatic capital.

The message was subtle but unmistakable:

If India is the market, the rest of South Asia is still the ecosystem.

And ecosystems can resist monopolies.

The New Power Equation: Market Size vs Collective Leverage

The biggest myth this episode challenges is the idea that cricket’s hierarchy is permanently fixed.

Yes, India remains the financial epicenter. That is unlikely to change. But financial centrality does not automatically translate into uncontested political control, especially when other boards act in coordinated fashion and target structural vulnerabilities in tournament economics.

What Bangladesh and Pakistan demonstrated is that:

• Participation is leverage.

• Rivalries are currency.

• Collective positioning can offset financial asymmetry.

This is not the collapse of cricket’s old order. But it may be the beginning of a negotiated order.

The Verdict: A Psychological Shift More Than an Institutional One

Institutions change slowly. Power perceptions change quickly.

And perception often precedes structural change.

The ICC and BCCI still hold enormous influence. But for the first time in years, two other boards showed they can force the system to adjust, not through rhetoric, but through calculated risk.

Bangladesh and Pakistan did not just resist pressure.

They rewrote the terms of engagement.

And in global cricket politics, that alone is a revolution.

Thank You 

Faisal Caesar 

Aminul Islam’s Necessary Stand

The Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB), under the leadership of Aminul Islam, has taken a decisive and long-overdue step to protect the integrity of Bangladesh cricket. Under the new framework, media access to the national team will be strictly regulated, limited to match days, official press conferences, formally invited events, and designated practice sessions as communicated by the board.

Predictably, this move has triggered outrage from sections of the Bangladeshi sports media. But outrage was inevitable. Because this decision does not merely restrict access, it dismantles an ecosystem of entitlement, manipulation, and long-standing media excess.

What the New Rules Say and Why They Matter

According to reports from Star News, the BCB formally informed the Bangladesh Sports Press Association (BSPA) that:

Media accreditation will be issued only to outlets registered under Bangladesh’s ICT Ministry

Unlicensed YouTubers and TikTokers will be barred from unrestricted access

The BSPA has rejected the decision outright

The backlash was instant. Yet, from the perspective of professionalism and national interest, this is one of the most productive decisions the BCB has taken in years.

The Rot of the “Open Access” Era

For over a decade, particularly during what many now describe as a fascist era, Bangladesh’s sports journalism ceased to resemble journalism at all. Cricket venues became open playgrounds where certain media personalities functioned less like reporters and more like personal aides, image managers, and ideological mouthpieces for powerful players and political interests.

This culture insulted journalism itself.

Journalists followed players into dressing rooms, hotels, and private spaces. Sensitive team information leaked freely. Cult figures were manufactured to distract public scrutiny. Syndicates emerged, quietly, gradually, until Bangladesh cricket began to decay from within. The damage was not sudden; it was necrotic. Slow. Internal. Devastating.

A Media With No Moral Authority

Bangladesh’s mainstream media has no credibility left to lecture institutions about ethics. The nation has watched how these outlets behaved over the last 15 years, how they aligned themselves with authoritarian power, how they reshaped narratives overnight after 2024, and how they continue to serve foreign interests while attempting to destabilize domestic institutions to resurrect discredited politics.

This is not speculation. It is record.

No one understands this better than Aminul Islam. He has lived through it, from inside the system. His decision is not impulsive. It is corrective.

Why Aminul Islam Refuses to Bend

Whether it was the Mustafizur Rahman issue, the T20 World Cup controversies, or now media access restrictions, Aminul Islam has remained firm. That firmness is precisely what irritates the media.

Instead of acknowledging the need for reform, they have chosen to attack the man enforcing it.

That tells us everything.

The Hathurusingha Parallel: Media Versus Authority

The current backlash mirrors an older pattern. During the Bangladesh–South Africa series, reports from Prothom Alo highlighted how the national team, under head coach Chandika Hathurusingha, restricted media access, conducted closed training sessions, and declined interviews.

Hathurusingha has faced relentless hostility from sections of Bangladeshi sports journalism since 2014, despite transforming Bangladesh into a competitive international side. Players like Shakib Al Hasan, Tamim Iqbal, and Mahmudullah Riyad have consistently backed his methods. Yet the media preferred to label him “autocratic” and “rude.”

Why?

Because he refused to play their game.

A coach enforcing discipline, privacy, and professionalism threatens a media culture built on proximity, gossip, and leverage.

Journalism or Superiority Complex?

The deeper issue is entitlement. A section of Bangladesh’s sports media believes access is a right, not a privilege. When denied, retaliation follows: twisted quotes, hostile headlines, character assassination.

We have seen this with administrators, players, and coaches alike. Nazmul Hassan’s comments, Mushfiqur Rahim’s silences, Soumya Sarkar and Liton Das avoiding certain journalists, all were weaponized into narratives of crisis.

One must ask honestly: what has this media contributed to Bangladesh cricket beyond noise?

There are excellent journalists in Bangladesh, but they are drowned out by those who lack technical knowledge, ethical discipline, and professional restraint.

The Syndicate Culture Must End

The unhealthy intimacy between certain journalists and powerful cricketers created a media-player syndicate that thrived on access and manipulation. This culture distorted public discourse, destabilized team environments, and undermined coaches, from Heath Streak to Thilan Samaraweera.

Aminul Islam’s intervention directly challenges this structure.

That is why it hurts.

This Is Leadership, Not Suppression

A free press does not mean an unaccountable press.

Aminul Islam’s decision is not anti-media; it is anti-corruption, anti-manipulation, and pro-professionalism. Bangladesh cricket cannot progress while being held hostage by entitlement masquerading as journalism.

The media had years to reform itself. It chose not to.

Now the institution has stepped in.

And for once, Bangladesh cricket is better for it.

Thank You 

Faisal Caesar 

When Cricket Becomes a Dictatorship: Nasser Hussain Calls Out India’s Power Play

Cricket has always carried a moral mythology. It was meant to be the Gentleman’s Game, a sport where rivalry ended at the boundary rope and politics stopped at the pavilion door. That mythology is now collapsing. And when Nasser Hussain publicly questions the selective morality of global cricket governance, it is not an off-hand remark, it is an indictment.

Hussain’s intervention exposes an uncomfortable truth: international cricket is no longer governed by rules, reciprocity, or sporting ethics. It is governed by money, leverage, and fear. And at the center of this imbalance sits the Indian cricket establishment, operating with the confidence of a regime that knows it cannot be challenged.

What Nasser Hussain Really Said (and Why It Matters)

Hussain’s critique is devastating precisely because it is simple. He asks the question everyone in cricket whispers but no institution dares to confront:

Would the ICC ever punish India the way it punishes others?

By raising this hypothetical, Hussain unmasks the double standards of the International Cricket Council. Bangladesh and Pakistan face swift disciplinary consequences. India, by contrast, enjoys negotiated exceptions, “neutral venues,” and moral exemptions.

This is not leadership. It is immunity.

The IPL as a Political Weapon

The most chilling example is the quiet removal of Mustafizur Rahman from Kolkata Knight Riders. This was not an injury call. It was not a cricketing decision. It was a signal.

When a domestic franchise league becomes an instrument of geopolitical pressure, cricket crosses a red line. Players stop being professionals and become hostages to national mood swings. Hussain rightly identifies this as the moment when sport gave way to coercion.

In any democratic sporting order, a legally contracted international player cannot be removed because of diplomatic discomfort. In cricket’s current ecosystem, however, Indian domestic politics now outranks international sporting law.

The Illusion of “Cricket Diplomacy”

For decades, India projected cricket as a bridge, between nations, cultures, and conflicts. Today, that bridge has become a checkpoint.

Refused handshakes. Avoided trophy ceremonies. Matches cancelled not by weather or logistics, but by ideology. What Hussain calls “depressing” is in fact something more serious: the normalization of hostility inside the dressing room.

Cricket diplomacy once softened borders. Indian cricket now hardens them.

Power Without Responsibility

The Board of Control for Cricket in India, the Board of Control for Cricket in India, commands unparalleled financial power. With that power should come stewardship. Instead, it has produced domination without accountability.

The consequences are self-defeating:

Commercial erosion: No India–Pakistan rivalry means no global spectacle. Everyone loses.

Sporting insecurity: If Mustafizur can be discarded overnight, no overseas player is safe.

Moral decay: The message is clear, compliance is rewarded, independence is punished.

This is not hegemony with vision. It is control without consequence.

The ICC’s Moral Collapse

The ICC’s role in this drama is the most damning of all. By enforcing rules rigidly on weaker boards while bending endlessly for India, as seen repeatedly in tournament arrangements like the Asia Cup, the ICC has forfeited its claim to neutrality.

A governing body that cannot govern its most powerful member is not a regulator. It is a subcontractor.

In practice, global cricket now operates on an unspoken hierarchy: some members are equal, but one member is indispensable.

A Lonely Empire at the Top

If cricket continues down this road, India may well stand alone at the summit, financially dominant, politically unchecked, and competitively isolated. But it will be a hollow peak.

The beauty of cricket lies in its pluralism: Bangladesh’s rise, Pakistan’s unpredictability, the shared chaos of rivalry. Strip those away, and the game becomes a closed circuit, loud, lucrative, and spiritually empty.

Nasser Hussain did not attack India. He defended cricket.

The real question now is whether the game still has the courage to defend itself.

Thank You

Faisal Caesar 

Cricket Under Hegemony: How India Turned a Regional Game into a Power Instrument

In South Asia, power has never been exercised only through borders, armies, or treaties. It has flowed through trade routes, water sharing, media, and quietly but decisively through cricket. What we are witnessing today is not a sporting dispute but the consolidation of regional hierarchy, with India at the apex and the rest of South Asia forced into varying degrees of compliance.

Pakistan’s Defence Minister Khawaja Asif’s call for an alternative global cricket body was quickly dismissed by Indian commentators as political theatrics. Yet such calls emerge only when institutional pathways collapse. His accusation that the International Cricket Council has become “hostage to Indian political interests” reflects a deeper South Asian anxiety: that multilateral platforms no longer function as neutral spaces when India’s interests are involved.

From Regional Power to Regional Enforcer

India’s dominance of cricket mirrors its broader regional posture assertive, asymmetrical, and increasingly intolerant of dissent. The Board of Control for Cricket in India is no longer just a sporting body; it is a strategic actor projecting Indian power across South Asia.

Under the current ICC revenue model, India controls nearly 40% of global cricket income. This financial concentration replicates a familiar regional pattern: economic dependency used to discipline neighbours. Smaller South Asian nations, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are structurally discouraged from challenging Indian preferences because the costs are existential.

In such an environment, “choice” becomes theoretical.

Pakistan: Too Big to Obey, Too Risky to Exclude

Pakistan occupies a unique and uncomfortable position in this hierarchy. Unlike smaller neighbours, it cannot be easily absorbed or ignored. Its boycott threat ahead of the T20 World Cup was not an act of withdrawal but a geopolitical signal, participation without consent.

This is precisely why Jay Shah, wearing both ICC authority and Indian institutional legacy, was pushed into reluctant diplomacy. The India–Pakistan fixture is not just a match; it is the single most valuable commodity in global cricket. Excluding Pakistan would fracture the commercial spine of the tournament.

The ICC’s response, dispatching Deputy Chair Imran Khwaja for quiet back-channel talks, exposed the truth: the institution cannot enforce neutrality when its biggest shareholder is also a regional hegemon.

Bangladesh and the Cost of Defiance

If Pakistan represents resistance, Bangladesh represents vulnerability.

The BCCI’s unilateral decision to release Mustafizur Rahman from the IPL, citing “political developments” - triggered a chain reaction that ended with Bangladesh refusing to tour India and being replaced by Scotland. This was not a scheduling issue; it was disciplined by substitution.

In South Asian terms, the message was unmistakable: defiance invites isolation. This is how hierarchy is maintained, not through overt bans, but through quiet rearrangements that punish without announcing punishment.

Normalising the Unthinkable

Former Indian cricketer Harbhajan Singh openly declared that India does not need Pakistan and can survive without it. Such statements matter not because they are policy, but because they reveal a mindset where exclusion is considered a legitimate option.

This is how dominance becomes normalised. First rhetorically. Then administratively. Finally, structurally.

South Asia has seen this pattern before, in trade negotiations, river water disputes, and regional diplomacy. Cricket is simply the latest arena.

The ICC as a Hollow Multilateral Shell

In theory, the ICC is a global institution. In practice, it resembles many South Asian multilateral frameworks where one power sets the rules while others adapt. When India controls revenue, scheduling, hosting rights, and broadcast windows, neutrality becomes impossible.

The result is a system where:

Smaller South Asian nations hesitate to speak.

Pakistan is managed as a “problem” rather than a stakeholder.

Decisions are framed as commercial inevitabilities rather than political choices.

This is not governance; it is a managed imbalance.

The Long-Term Cost for the Region

India’s approach may deliver short-term control, but it carries long-term risks. A region where sport mirrors political hierarchy will eventually fracture. Associate nations will stagnate. Bilateral distrust will harden. And cricket, once South Asia’s rare shared language, will become another theatre of rivalry and resentment.

You cannot build regional legitimacy on unilateral power.

If the ICC continues to function as an extension of Indian dominance rather than a counterbalance to it, South Asia will not see a golden age of cricket but a familiar story of centralised authority, silenced peripheries, and institutional decay.

Cricket does not need a new empire. It needs a genuinely plural order. Without it, the game will survive, but only as a reflection of power, not as a contest of equals.

Thank You 

Faisal Caesar 

When Cricket Stops Pretending to Be Neutral: India, Power, and the ICC’s Double Standards

Pakistan's decision to boycott its T20 World Cup match against India has been framed by much of the global media as an act of politicisation. That framing is misleading. What the boycott actually exposes is a far more uncomfortable truth: international cricket has long ceased to be neutral, and the International Cricket Council (ICC) now operates within an ecosystem structurally tilted in India’s favour.

The immediate trigger for Pakistan’s decision was security and diplomacy. Following deadly, coordinated attacks in Balochistan, attacks Pakistan’s interior minister publicly attributed to India, Islamabad chose not to proceed, with a high-profile sporting encounter against its rival. Whether or not one accepts Pakistan’s allegation, the principle involved is not novel. National governments have repeatedly exercised discretion over participation in ICC events based on security and political considerations.

What is novel is the selective outrage.

Bangladesh, Neutral Venues, and Selective Fairness

Tensions had already been building before Pakistan’s announcement. In January, Bangladesh requested that its World Cup matches be shifted away from India, citing security concerns. The ICC rejected the request outright and then went further, removing Bangladesh from the tournament altogether and replacing it with Scotland.

This decision was extraordinary. Historically, the ICC has accommodated such requests. India itself has refused to play in Pakistan for years, with its matches routinely shifted to neutral venues. England, Australia, and New Zealand have all declined tours or fixtures in the past without being expelled from tournaments or financially penalised.

Yet when Bangladesh sought identical consideration, it was denied. The principle of “neutral venues for security reasons,” long treated as legitimate when invoked by India, suddenly became unacceptable when invoked against India.

This asymmetry is the real scandal.

The ICC–BCCI Blur

The controversy has also reignited scrutiny over the increasingly blurred line between the ICC and the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). The perception, fair or not, is that global cricket governance is now effectively anchored in New Delhi.

That perception matters because money matters.

An India–Pakistan World Cup match is not merely a fixture; it is the tournament’s financial engine. Advertising slots during such games sell for astronomical sums. Broadcasters price entire tournament valuations around this single matchup. When Pakistan withdrew, panic followed, not in cricketing circles, but in boardrooms.

This reaction reveals the structural dependency of the ICC on India-centric commercial logic. When India advances deep into tournaments, revenues soar. When India exits early, as in the 2007 World Cup, broadcasters panic and financial models collapse. That dependency has quietly reshaped governance priorities.

Fairness, under such conditions, becomes conditional.

Precedent Matters And Pakistan Is Within It

The charge that Pakistan is “politicising cricket” collapses under historical scrutiny.

In 1996, Australia refused to play matches in Sri Lanka. In 2003, England and New Zealand declined tours citing security concerns. Zimbabwe skipped the 2009 T20 World Cup. None faced revenue sanctions. West Indies continue to receive full ICC distributions despite repeated failures to qualify for global events.

These are not exceptions. They are precedents.

ICC revenue allocation has always been structural, not punitive. Participation has never been enforced through financial coercion. To suggest otherwise now—implicitly threatening Pakistan with “long-term consequences” marks a dangerous departure from established norms.

The India Exception

What truly undermines the moral argument against Pakistan is India’s own record. India has unilaterally suspended bilateral cricket with Pakistan for over a decade without consequence. Entire Future Tours Programme cycles have been disrupted. The ICC did not intervene. No fines were imposed. No lectures were delivered about “the global game.”

Political selectivity, in other words, has already been normalised, primarily when it serves Indian preferences.

Pakistan’s response, therefore, is not radical. It is reciprocal.

Power, Not Principle

It is also worth noting that Pakistan is no longer institutionally dependent on ICC revenue in the way it once was. The Pakistan Super League has created an independent commercial base, placing the PCB among a small group of boards with financial leverage outside ICC distributions.

That reality alters the power equation. The implicit assumption that Pakistan must comply to survive is outdated.

The Real Question

This episode forces cricket to confront an uncomfortable question:

Is the ICC a multilateral sporting body, or a revenue management arm of Indian cricket?

If neutral venues are acceptable for India but unacceptable for Bangladesh, that is not governance; it is a hierarchy.

If political discretion is legitimate for some but condemned for others, that is not neutrality; it is power.

Pakistan’s boycott does not politicise cricket.

It merely exposes who has been doing so all along.

Thank You 

Faisal Caesar 

The Gilded Cage: Indian Autocracy and the Slow Death of World Cricket

Cricket today is no longer governed; it is managed, monetized, and manipulated. What was once a multilateral sporting ecosystem has been reduced to a hierarchical order dominated by a single actor: the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). By 2026, the erosion of cricket’s global character is no longer subtle. It is structural, institutional, and deliberate, enabled by an International Cricket Council (ICC) that has surrendered regulatory authority in exchange for commercial survival.

This is not dominance through excellence; it is autocracy through leverage.

Financial Capture: How the ICC Became a Subsidiary

Under the current ICC revenue-sharing model, the BCCI absorbs approximately 38.5% of global cricket revenues. England and Australia, historical pillars of the game, receive around 6% each, while most full members survive on allocations below 5%. Associate nations remain permanently dependent, structurally incapable of closing the gap.

This is not redistribution. It is rent extraction.

India’s control over nearly 80% of global cricket’s commercial value, driven by broadcasting rights, sponsorship concentration, and advertising markets, has allowed the BCCI to convert market size into veto power. The ICC, rather than counterbalancing this asymmetry, has institutionalized it. The result is a governance monoculture in which every major decision, Future Tours Programme scheduling, tournament formats, hosting rights, even leadership appointments, as presumed, requires implicit Indian approval.

Global cricket is no longer planned around sporting equity; it is optimized for Indian television ratings.

The Myth of Neutrality: The Hybrid Model as a Political Weapon

The most glaring manifestation of this imbalance emerged during the 2024–2026 tournament cycle, particularly in the selective application of the so-called “hybrid model.”

For the 2025 ICC Champions Trophy, India refused to travel to Pakistan, citing vaguely defined “security concerns”despite multiple international teams touring Pakistan without incident. The ICC capitulated immediately, relocating India’s matches to the UAE, effectively granting them a de facto home environment.

Yet when other nations raised parallel concerns regarding conditions and fairness during the T20 World Cup, co-hosted by India and Sri Lanka, the same flexibility vanished. Scheduling was structured almost entirely around Indian prime-time viewership, forcing players into brutal heat, compressed recovery windows, and intercontinental travel patterns designed to maximize broadcaster revenue rather than athletic integrity.

Neutrality, it turns out, is available only to India.

Bangladesh’s Defiance: A Rare Breach in the Wall

Against this backdrop of institutional submission, the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) unexpectedly emerged as a fault line in the system. The 2026 standoff—sparked by BCCI pressure on IPL franchises to sideline Bangladeshi players, most notably the Mustafizur Rahman episode, exposed how league power is now weaponized to discipline smaller boards.

Bangladesh’s refusal to participate in the T20 World Cup in India was not a tantrum; it was a mirror. India’s own precedent, refusing to travel to Pakistan while demanding accommodation elsewhere, made Bangladesh’s position not only legitimate, but logically unassailable.

When the ICC refused to relocate Bangladesh’s matches to neutral Sri Lanka, despite having done precisely that for India months earlier, it stripped the organization of its last claim to procedural fairness. As Bangladesh’s sports advisor Asif Nazrul noted, the episode confirmed that ICC “justice” is conditional, hierarchical, and transactional.

For once, a board refused to sell the dignity of 200 million supporters in exchange for compliance.

From Big Three to Big One: The Hollowing Out of the Game

What began as the “Big Three” era has collapsed into a “Big One” system. Test cricket is being starved of funding to accommodate an ever-expanding IPL window. Associate nations are kept in a permanent state of dependency, funded just enough to exist, never enough to compete. Competitive balance is treated as a threat, not an objective.

This is not stewardship. It is managed decline.

Cricket, under BCCI-driven governance, is being reshaped into a scripted commercial product where outcomes, venues, and calendars orbit a single national interest. The sport’s global legitimacy is the collateral damage.

India’s dominance is not rooted in superior diplomacy or a coherent vision for cricket’s future. It rests almost entirely on demographic mass and market coercion. By reducing the ICC to an administrative shell, the BCCI has secured short-term profits while accelerating long-term irrelevance outside the Indian market.

The Bangladesh Parallel, and the Moral Inversion

Bangladesh’s objections mirror India’s own stance during the Champions Trophy, yet with greater moral consistency. India not only maintains an openly hostile political narrative toward Bangladesh, but continues to shelter Hasina Wajid, a fugitive convicted by the International Crimes Tribunal, linked to the deaths of over 1,400 Bengalis.

In this context, Bangladesh’s refusal to travel is not merely procedural, it is ethical.

What is truly damning is the spectacle of ICC board members accepting these contradictions without protest. The Champions Trophy was not merely compromised for Pakistan; New Zealand and South Africa paid a tangible sporting price through forced travel that directly impacted their knockout-stage performances. They complied, and were punished for it.

A Game Held Hostage

World cricket today operates inside a gilded cage: lucrative, polished, and fundamentally unfree. Until boards collectively challenge this concentration of power, the erosion will continue, quietly, efficiently, and irreversibly.

The “Gentleman’s Game” is no longer governed by gentlemen. It is governed by a bully with a balance sheet.

And history suggests that no sport survives for long when only one nation’s interests are allowed to matter.

When Cricket Becomes a Border Checkpoint - How India Hijacked Cricket and Turned It into a Tool of Power

Cricket, in South Asia, was never merely a sport. It was a shared language, spoken fluently even when diplomacy failed, even when borders hardened and guns replaced dialogue. That language is now being rewritten, not with runs and wickets, but with political pressure, strategic exclusion, and calculated silence.

The recent removal of Bangladesh fast bowler Mustafizur Rahman from the Indian Premier League (IPL) is not an isolated administrative decision. It is a symptom, perhaps the clearest yet, of how India has transformed cricket from soft power into a blunt geopolitical instrument.

The Incident That Exposed the System

On January 3, BCCI secretary Devajit Saikia told India’s ANI that the board had instructed Kolkata to release Bangladesh pacer Mustafizur Rahman due to “recent developments.” Kolkata complied the same day.

That phrase,“recent developments,i"is deliberately elastic. It is the kind of bureaucratic fog that allows an institution to do something political while pretending it is procedural. No injury was cited as the reason. No sporting logic was publicly offered. The implication, widely understood in Bangladesh and echoed in Indian commentary, was that the decision was tied to the worsening political climate between Bangladesh and India after the fall of Sheikh Hasina’s government in August 2024 and her subsequent refuge in India.

In other words: the bowler was not dropped from a league; he was dropped from a relationship.

How Cricket Becomes a Punishment Tool

In a normal sporting ecosystem, franchise cricket is transactional. Players move across borders because leagues want skill, and players want careers. That is what a global sport looks like when it is allowed to behave like a sport.

South Asia is increasingly different. Here, cricket is mutating into a diplomatic lever, a tool not only for image-making, but also for discipline and punishment. And the country that can do this most effectively is India, because India is not simply a participant in world cricket. India is the market.

The IPL is the richest franchise tournament on earth. India supplies the largest audience. Money flows in one direction so overwhelmingly that many boards and institutions have learned to speak softly around Delhi, not because Delhi is always right, but because Delhi is always rich.

When a sport becomes dependent on a single treasury, neutrality becomes a luxury. And morality becomes negotiable.

The Real Message: “Access Is Conditional”

If Mustafizur can be bought at auction for an enormous fee and then removed on a politically convenient pretext, what does that tell the region?

It tells every neighbouring country and every player that entry into “Indian cricket” is not a sporting matter. It is permission-based. It is conditional. It can be withdrawn, suddenly and publicly, as a signal.

That is why this episode is being read, quite reasonably, as a statement: Indian cricket is not a platform you earn; it is a privilege India grants.

This is not soft power anymore. This is coercive power wrapped in the glamour of sport.

The Domestic Engine Behind the Decision

The ugliness does not stop at institutions. The episode reveals how quickly major cricket decisions can be hijacked by India’s domestic majoritarian ecosystem.

According to the narrative circulating in Bangladesh (and referenced in Indian critiques), hardline Hindu nationalist groups pressured Kolkata not to play Mustafizur and issued threats, including towards the franchise and its owner. The point here is not the theatre of outrage; it is what followed: capitulation.

If administrators and political authorities bend to communal agitation, they do not merely “avoid controversy.” They legitimise intimidation as a method. They teach the region that threats work—and that the boundary line between fan passion and political bullying has dissolved.

A sport that kneels to communal pressure becomes a billboard for communal power.

Security: The Question India Cannot Escape

Bangladesh’s response, banning IPL broadcasts, formally raising concerns with the ICC, and seeking to move World Cup matches out of India, was not just nationalist theatre. It was rooted in a simple, devastating question:

If India cannot ensure the security and dignity of one Bangladeshi cricketer in the IPL, what guarantee exists for an entire team, management, journalists, and travelling supporters during a World Cup?

Bangladesh’s position, as stated in your text, is that ICC’s security assessment acknowledged specific risks. Whether the ICC ultimately shifts venues or not, the damage is already done: India’s credibility as a “safe, neutral host” has been dragged into the political mud—largely by India’s own domestic climate and the BCCI’s own choices.

The Pattern Is Familiar: Pakistan Was the Prototype

For years, India’s relationship with Pakistan has shown what happens when cricket is treated as a geopolitical theatre. Tournaments get “hybrid models.” Venues become battlegrounds. Symbolic gestures, handshakes, photo-ops, and trophy presentations become diplomatic statements.

Your text cites an Asia Cup example where India’s objections drove venue arrangements and where symbolic refusals intensified controversy. The details of any specific incident can be debated, but the pattern is unmistakable: India increasingly behaves as though tournaments are not mutually governed events but negotiated spaces where Indian preference becomes de facto policy.

The problem is not that India has interests. Every country does. The problem is that India’s interests, backed by unmatched financial weight, frequently become everyone else’s reality.

What Was Lost: Cricket as a Bridge

South Asia once had a different idea of cricket—a rare shared language that could survive when everything else broke down. The 2004 India tour of Pakistan is often remembered as the high watermark: “friendship series,” leaders speaking of winning hearts, fans travelling under special arrangements. Even after Mumbai 2008, cricket diplomacy returned in flashes, like the 2011 World Cup semifinal attended by both prime ministers.

Those moments mattered because they suggested something larger: that sport could force adversaries to sit, to look, to breathe the same air.

The Mustafizur episode moves in the opposite direction. It says: we can keep you out, and we can do it with a smile, and the world will accept it because our money runs the sport.

That is a terrifying precedent.

India’s Cricket Empire and the ICC Problem

The uncomfortable truth is that the ICC, structurally, is not built to resist India. When one board dominates revenue, the regulator becomes psychologically captured, less a referee than a manager of the dominant player’s satisfaction.

Your text also points to the wider perception of institutional proximity between Indian political power and cricket governance. Even if one avoids personalising the argument, the broader issue stands: when a sport’s global governance is shaped by one country’s money and political climate, it ceases to look global. It begins to look imperial.

And empires rarely tolerate equal neighbours.

Bangladesh’s Defiance and Its Own Test

Bangladesh’s assertive response carries symbolic force. A smaller nation has said: honour first. That matters in a region where small states often learn to swallow insults for access.

But Bangladesh also faces its own test: defiance must become a strategy, not just rhetoric. A bold stance can win a moment; diplomacy must win the decade. If the region is moving toward a future where sport and politics collide openly, Bangladesh will need more than anger; it will need a clear plan: security protocols, negotiation leverage, regional alliances, and economic resilience.

Because India’s greatest advantage is not just nationalism. It is dependent on other dependencies on Indian cricket money, Indian markets, and Indian approvals.

The Verdict: This Is Not Cricket, It’s Control

So, is it still cricket?

Not in the moral sense. Not when a player becomes collateral. Not when “recent developments” becomes a euphemism for political filtration. Not when communal intimidation sets a selection policy. Not when the world’s most powerful board behaves like a state ministry, with franchises and players as its paperwork.

India has every right to be influential. It does not have the right to turn influence into punishment, to treat access like a leash, and to call it normal governance.

Cricket, at its best, is competition with restraint, power disciplined by rules, rivalry contained by ethics. When India weaponises cricket’s economy and domestic political climate to police neighbours, it doesn’t just damage Bangladesh. It damages the game’s meaning.

And once a game becomes a visa regime, once it becomes conditional entry, conditional dignity, conditional belonging, then the scoreboard is no longer the point.

The point becomes domination.

Thank You 

Faisal Caesar

When Heroes Go Quiet: Tamim Iqbal’s Moral Collapse

Tamim Iqbal’s greatest achievement in Bangladeshi cricket may not be his runs, but his mastery of timing - political timing, narrative timing, and most importantly, self-preserving timing.

For nearly two decades, Tamim cultivated the image of the defiant batsman, the man of the people, the torchbearer of Bangladesh’s cricketing pride. Yet when the people themselves needed voices of moral clarity, that image dissolved into studied silence. This silence was not accidental. It was strategic.

Tamim belongs to a powerful trinity, alongside Mashrafe Bin Mortaza and Shakib Al Hasan, that transformed Bangladeshi cricket from a sporting institution into a carefully managed ecosystem of influence, patronage, and selective outrage. Cricket, already weakened by syndicates and opaque power structures, became further politicized, not through resistance, but through compliance.

What separates Tamim from the fans who sustained him is not class or fame, but conscience.

In 2024, when innocent lives were lost amid national turmoil, the silence from Bangladesh’s most powerful cricketing voices was deafening. Long before that, when a prominent and widely admired figure was murdered in broad daylight, Tamim and his contemporaries chose discretion over dissent. In moments when moral neutrality itself becomes a political act, silence is not innocence, it is alignment.

Throughout his career, Tamim demonstrated a consistent pattern: confrontation only when it is safe, emotion only when it benefits him, and rebellion only when it can be theatrically contained. His much-publicized emotional episodes, particularly the 2023 retirement drama, were not acts of protest but performances of control, designed to redirect public sympathy while leaving entrenched power structures untouched.

This is where Tamim’s opportunism becomes undeniable.

Like Mashrafe and Shakib, Tamim learned early that in Bangladesh, sporting stardom can be leveraged into political capital without ever paying the price of political responsibility. He learned that remaining useful to power is safer than being accountable to the public. And so, even today, he continues to serve interests larger than cricket and far removed from the fans whose devotion built his legacy.

Harsh criticism, therefore, is not cruelty, it is consequence.

When public figures enjoy extraordinary privilege while refusing moral accountability, they invite scrutiny. When they benefit from systems that suppress dissent, they become collaborators—willing or otherwise. And when they repeatedly choose self-interest over solidarity, history remembers them not as heroes, but as enablers.

Tamim Iqbal’s tragedy is not that he failed Bangladesh cricket. It is that, when Bangladesh itself was tested, he chose comfort over courage.

And for collaborators of authoritarian systems, silence, no matter how polished, is never neutral.

Thank You 

Faisal Caesar 

Mushfiqur Rahim at 100 Tests: The Relentless Craftsman Who Willed Bangladesh into Belonging

The childish celebration that spans for more than two decades - The cherubic smile that softened even the most exhausting days – The celebration with a roar and clenched fist. The long, meditative hours of batting practice under a punishing sun. These are the images that surface whenever the name Mushfiqur Rahim is uttered in Bangladesh cricket. They are not merely memories; they are fragments of a national journey—an epic told through the life of a cricketer who refused to surrender to history, circumstance, or mediocrity.

Now, as Mushfiqur becomes the first Bangladeshi to step into the rarefied company of 100 Test cricketers, his milestone demands more than celebration. It demands a reckoning with what he has symbolised: resilience in a cricket culture built on the uneasy coexistence of soaring dreams and cruel limitations.

Bangladesh has played 155 Tests in its 25-year history. Mushfiqur has featured in nearly two-thirds of them. That is not longevity; that is institutional memory.

A Career Forged in Adversity

When Mushfiqur Rahim first walked onto Lord’s in 2005, he looked startlingly young—almost child-like—set against the theatre of cricket’s most storied stage. His tiny frame and cautious smile contrasted violently with the four-pronged English pace attack poised to dismantle an inexperienced Bangladesh side. Yet he resisted. It was not a match-saving act, not even a noteworthy statistical contribution, but it contained something Bangladesh cricket desperately needed in those days: defiance.

Defiance from a team mocked for simply being present.

Defiance from a boy who could easily have been swallowed by the cynicism that enveloped Bangladesh cricket in those formative years.

Through the next two decades, that thread of resistance evolved into a science—a disciplined, almost monastic approach to preparation that became Mushfiqur’s signature. He was neither the most flamboyant nor the most naturally gifted, but he became the most dependable. And in a nation where sporting fragility has often been cultural, Mushfiqur’s discipline was radical.

The Last of a Generation

The modern pillars of Bangladesh cricket—Shakib Al Hasan, Mashrafe Mortaza, Tamim Iqbal, Mahmudullah—have all now faded from the arena. Yet Mushfiqur remains, not because he had fewer reasons to retire but because he had more reasons to keep going. When he quit T20Is and ODIs, whispers grew louder that he was nearing the end. Mushfiqur instead treated the speculation as an indictment of his work ethic.

He responded the only way he knows: with runs, with fitness, with sweat, with monastic routine.

At 38, he is still in the “why retire?” phase of his journey—an astonishing mindset in a cricket culture that has historically lacked long-term athletic conditioning, infrastructure, or continuity.

The Arc of a Craftsman

Mushfiqur’s career has not been smooth—it has been sculpted. He entered Test cricket with technical flaws, fought through years of inconsistency, and rebuilt himself. Coaches like Dav Whatmore and Jamie Siddons tinkered with his backlift, his pull shot, and his game against pace. Tamim recalls that the raw talent was never the story; the story was the work ethic. Mushfiqur made himself.

He did so under difficult conditions: a brittle batting order, a domestic structure still learning how to behave like a Test system, and a national expectation perpetually oscillating between premature hope and volatile disappointment.

His double-hundred in Galle in 2013—Bangladesh’s first—was not just a statistical milestone; it felt like an emancipation. Mominul Haque, who debuted in that match, remembers it as a watershed, an innings that allowed younger batters to believe that Bangladesh could dream beyond survival.

That was the year Mushfiqur turned the corner. His average leapt past 50, his discipline matured, and his role crystallised: he became Bangladesh’s immovable spine.

Captain, Keeper, Workhorse

Few cricketers anywhere have carried a national team the way Mushfiqur has.

He captained 34 Tests.

He kept wicket in 55.

He combined both roles in 28 matches—second only to MS Dhoni in Test history.

And he still averaged over 41 as captain.

When he finally relinquished the gloves in 2019, his batting blossomed further. The numbers reveal the story of a cricketer who aged like a craftsman, not an athlete: smarter, calmer, technically tighter, more self-assured.

Since 2013, Mushfiqur has averaged over 42 in 69 Tests—the only Bangladeshi batter with a 40+ average over that period.

The Traveller in a Land of Two-Test Series

There is a peculiar tragedy in Mushfiqur’s career. Had he been Australian, English, or Indian, he might have played 150 or even 180 Tests. Instead, Bangladesh’s limited fixture list forced his career into a series of compressed, under-resourced, two-match tours. Yet, within those constraints, he carved out achievements that rival global greats:

Three Test double-centuries — the most by any wicketkeeper-batter in history.

Hundreds in six countries.

Bangladesh’s highest away average among top-order batters.

Involved in five of the team’s six partnerships exceeding 250 runs.

A balls-per-dismissal ratio of 78.6 — the toughest Bangladeshi batter to dislodge.

He was not merely a participant in Bangladesh’s story; he was the axis around which its Test evolution rotated.

The Human Behind the Legend

The milestone Test brought emotional truths to the surface. In the team huddle before his 100th match, he told his teammates something revealing and profoundly un-Bangladeshi in its humility:

“Mushfiqur Rahim exists because of Bangladesh. I am just a drop in the ocean.”

He dedicated his century in that match—he became only the eleventh cricketer in history to score a hundred in his 100th Test—to his grandparents, who once confessed they wished to live long enough to watch him bat.

These gestures strip away the statistical armour and expose the emotional engine that has powered this journey: gratitude, duty, and a sense of national responsibility that is rare in modern cricket.

A Legacy Beyond the Scorebook

Mushfiqur Rahim is more than the sum of his runs or the longevity of his career. He is the embodiment of Bangladesh’s slow, painful, stubborn rise into Test relevance. He represents an entire generation that learned to endure humiliation, absorb defeat, and still imagine a better cricketing tomorrow.

He is proof that greatness in Bangladesh cricket is not something inherited; it is something engineered.

As he looks ahead to yet another Test series—Pakistan at home next April—he leaves the future deliberately ambiguous. Perhaps he doesn’t need to plan too far. Legends rarely do. Their careers do not end; they taper into memory, into habit, into cultural inheritance.

In a cricket world structured against the small and unfashionable, Mushfiqur Rahim stood only five feet tall but stood tall enough for all of Bangladesh.

And perhaps that is the true meaning of his 100th Test: not a milestone, but a metaphor for a nation that learned—through him—how to stay, resist, and finally belong.

Thank You

Faisal Caesar

A Trial by Fire in Multan: Pakistan’s Triumph and Bangladesh’s Reckoning

Setting the Stage

The Multan Cricket Stadium, newly inaugurated as Test cricket’s 81st venue, welcomed Bangladesh with hope and Pakistan with expectation. For Bangladesh, it was a chance to avoid defeat in their fourth Test; for Pakistan, a homecoming wrapped in the fervour of returning Test cricket to Multan after two decades. Yet, by the third morning, the contest had turned into a study in extremes — Pakistan’s dominance illuminating Bangladesh’s frailties. What unfolded was one of the heaviest defeats in Test history, raising sharp questions about the International Cricket Council’s haste in granting Bangladesh Test status.

Bangladesh’s Faltering Beginnings

The visitors’ optimism was short-lived. Skipper Naimur Rahman chose to bat on a surface expected to take turn, but his side’s lack of technique and patience was soon exposed. Within 41.1 overs — barely two sessions — they were dismissed for 134. Coincidence became cruelty when their second innings consumed the same number of overs, though yielding 14 more runs. Habibul Bashar, with a composed 56 not out, alone offered resistance, his effort a solitary beacon in otherwise cavalier batting.

Pakistan’s Batting Masterclass

If Bangladesh’s innings revealed fragility, Pakistan’s response embodied exuberance. They amassed 546 for three declared at a dazzling 4.75 runs an over, striking 82 boundaries in a display that bordered on the theatrical. Saeed Anwar, fluent and destructive, crossed 4,000 Test runs while racing to 101. His partner, the debutant Taufeeq Umar, etched his name in history as Pakistan’s eighth batsman to score a century on debut.

Inzamam-ul-Haq, the local hero, fulfilled a childhood dream with a century in front of his home crowd, though dehydration forced him to retire. From there, Yousuf Youhana and Abdul Razzaq turned the spectacle into a race for glory — both storming to centuries, their unbroken partnership of 165 an exhibition of command. Four of the five centuries were scored in a single day, a statistical feat that elevated the performance into the annals of Test cricket.

The Bowling Symphony: Spin and Pace in Concert

If Pakistan’s batsmen were overwhelmed with artistry, their bowlers dismantled Bangladesh with ruthless efficiency. Danish Kaneria, still in the infancy of his career, spun webs with bounce and guile, taking six wickets in each innings for just 94 runs. Ten dismissals fell to close-in catches, four pouched by Younis Khan, who set a record for a substitute fielder. Waqar Younis contributed with a fiery spell of 4 for 19, while even debutant Shoaib Malik chipped in with two wickets.

Bangladesh’s second innings — beginning with a mountain to climb — collapsed under the twin pressure of Kaneria’s spin and Waqar’s pace. Bashar again fought with dignity, but his defiance was lonely. The team folded for 148, and the inevitable innings-and-264-run defeat was sealed within two and a half days.

 Records and Rarities

This match was not merely lopsided; it was historically significant.

Five Centuries in One Innings: Pakistan’s 546 for three is the lowest total to include five hundreds, eclipsing the West Indies’ 550 with four in 1982–83.

Left-Handed Landmarks: For the first time in Test history, both left-handed openers — Anwar and Taufeeq — scored centuries in the same innings.

Twin Century Partnerships for the Same Wicket: Youhana was central to two unbroken century stands for the fourth wicket, a unique feat.

Centuries on Debut in Successive Tests: Taufeeq Umar’s hundred in Multan was mirrored the very next day in Colombo by Sri Lanka’s T.T. Samaraweera — a quirky coincidence in Test lore.

A Match Shadowed by Tragedy

Yet amid the celebrations, the occasion was darkened by personal grief. Saeed Anwar, whose century had opened the floodgates, learned of the death of his young daughter, Bismah, during the match. His quiet exit from the contest lent the triumph a sombre undertone — a reminder that cricket’s ecstasies are never far from life’s sorrows.

Lessons and Legacies

For Pakistan, the match was both a statement of strength and a glimpse of the future: Kaneria’s rise as a genuine spin threat, Umar’s promising debut, and a batting order overflowing with confidence. For Bangladesh, it was a stark confrontation with reality. Their elevation to Test cricket was intended to accelerate development, but the gulf in skill and temperament suggested a premature leap.

Multan, with its scorching heat and fervent crowds, staged not only a contest but also a metaphor: Pakistan’s cricket blossomed under the sun, while Bangladesh wilted in its glare. The innings defeat, emphatic and historic, was both a celebration of Pakistani brilliance and an urgent call for Bangladesh to rebuild if they were to claim a place among the serious nations of Test cricket.

Thank You

Faisal Caesar

Of squandered chances and patient triumphs: Bangladesh’s woes and Sri Lanka’s quiet reawakening

Test cricket, perhaps more than any other sport, is a stern tutor. It exposes impatience, magnifies errors, and punishes lapses in discipline with an almost cruel precision. The second Test in Colombo was such a lesson — a canvas on which Bangladesh’s enduring struggles were painted in anxious strokes, even as Sri Lanka quietly sketched out their own reassuring tale of resurgence.

Bangladesh: promise betrayed by impatience and frailty

For Bangladesh, the match began with hope. Winning the toss on a track at the SSC that traditionally flatters batters, they aspired to set the game’s tone. Instead, their innings was a tragic anthology of starts squandered. Six of their batters crossed 20, yet none reached 50. Each seemed to settle just long enough to hint at permanence, only to perish to a reckless stroke or a lapse in judgment. It was not so much that the pitch was hostile — it was that Bangladesh conspired against themselves.

It’s telling that their most substantial partnership, between Mushfiqur Rahim and Litton Das, came with two reprieves handed on a silver platter by Sri Lanka’s fielders. Even then, it was a transient resistance. Bangladesh’s innings was stitched together by the generosity of dropped catches, edges falling tantalisingly short, and missed run-out chances. Yet they could only crawl to 220 for 8 by the close on day one. It felt like a team forever one moment away from collapse — a psychological fragility every bit as costly as technical flaws.

Worse still, Bangladesh compounded these batting frailties with wayward bowling. Aside from Taijul Islam, who turned in a lionhearted five-for, their bowlers too often erred in line or length. When they did build pressure, they failed to sustain it, leaking boundaries that undid spells of good work. In total, they were a side wrestling with their own inconsistency — a problem more chronic than situational.

Sri Lanka: a quiet revolution in temperament

For Sri Lanka, meanwhile, this Test was a portrait of deliberate, almost old-fashioned Test match cricket — a demonstration that control over time remains the game’s most formidable weapon.

Their resurgence is not the stuff of dramatic flair. It is the quiet evolution of a side learning once more how to be methodical. With the ball, they were patient. Despite five dropped catches and missed chances that might have rattled a less disciplined unit, they stuck doggedly to probing lines, trusting that a mistake would eventually arrive. Asitha Fernando and Vishwa Fernando kept hammering the corridor outside off, while debutant Sonal Dinusha bowled with a composure that belied his inexperience. Even Prabath Jayasuriya, wicketless in the first innings, persisted until the surface rewarded him spectacularly in the second.

Their batting was an even richer story. Pathum Nissanka played an innings that was both a masterclass and a metaphor: 158 runs crafted with an unhurried grace that Bangladesh could not emulate. His shot selection was underwritten by a deep assurance; his ability to shift gears — from cautious to imperious — showcased a temperament honed for the long form. Where Bangladesh’s batters seemed forever tempted by risk, Nissanka exuded a calm certainty that allowed the game to bend to his rhythm.

When Bangladesh did apply themselves — as Taijul did with the ball, or briefly when Shadman Islam flirted with a second successive fifty — it only underscored how costly the collective lapses were. They were moments of resistance drowned out by a tide of their own making.

A match decided in moments — and mindsets

In the end, the statistical verdict — an innings-and-78-run victory for Sri Lanka — tells only half the story. The deeper narrative is one of contrasts: Bangladesh’s inability to turn promise into permanence, Sri Lanka’s refusal to panic when catches went down or the scoreboard slowed.

It is also a testament to the timeless truths of Test cricket: that even on a surface with runs to be made, discipline is king; that pressure is not always built by wickets alone but by denying easy runs, by choking off release. Sri Lanka bowled 30 maidens across Bangladesh’s first innings alone, each one a subtle squeeze on the psyche.

Bangladesh, by contrast, often bowled too short or too full, too anxious to force the game rather than let it evolve. Their batting too betrayed this urgency — attacking when they should have consolidated, defending without intent when they needed to score.

Two teams, two journeys

In a way, this match was the crossroads of two trajectories. Sri Lanka are a team quietly rebuilding an identity around patience and process. The likes of Nissanka and Jayasuriya are symbols of this — players who understand that Test victories are accumulated through small moments won again and again across sessions.

Bangladesh remain tantalisingly close yet frustratingly far. They possess the talent: Shanto, Mushfiqur, Litton, Taijul — all capable on their day. But Tests are not won on scattered days. They are won by sustaining standards across days, across innings, across fleeting moments when the game teeters and demands calm. Bangladesh, by dropping catches, playing rash strokes, and squandering bowling pressure, allowed each of those moments to slip away.

The enduring lesson

As Colombo’s sun set on a fourth-day finish, it left behind more than just numbers on a scoresheet. It offered a lesson as old as the format itself: that in Test cricket, unlike any other, impatience extracts a heavy price, while those who are willing to endure, to trust the process over impulse, find themselves rewarded not just with victory but with a growing aura of reliability.

Sri Lanka walk away from this series heartened by the shape their resurgence is taking — a methodical, disciplined, quietly confident side that seems ready to embrace harder challenges ahead. Bangladesh leave with familiar regrets and, hopefully, the resolve to address them. For in the end, cricket rarely forgives repetition of old mistakes. It merely waits to punish them again.

Thank You 

Faisal Caesar 

Angelo Mathews: A Farewell to a Cricketer Who Did Everything, Everywhere, All at Once

 A Walk Into History at Galle

On June 21, 2025, under overcast skies and amidst the salty breeze of the Galle Fort, one of Sri Lanka’s last cricketing titans walked off the Test stage for the final time. Angelo Davis Mathews—battered, bruised, and brilliant across 16 years—played his final innings in whites, scoring just 8 off 45 balls. There was no fairy-tale finish. But the emotion was no less overwhelming.

As he departed, a giant cobra-shaped kite soared above the Galle International Stadium—a poetic tribute during kite-flying season. On it, written simply, was his name. "Angelo." No surname needed. Everyone knew who it was for.

Mathews had announced before the match that this would be his last dance in the Test arena. It brought to an end a journey that saw him rise from a precocious all-rounder to a stoic leader and, eventually, a symbol of endurance in a cricketing landscape that often felt uncertain and unstable.

The Making of a Modern Marvel

Mathews’ introduction to the Test arena came in 2009, during a turbulent period of rebuilding. The old guard—Jayawardene, Sangakkara, and Dilshan—was still standing tall, but cracks were appearing. Into this mix walked Mathews, offering something rare: a fast-bowling allrounder, capable of bowling tidy seamers and batting with equal parts flair and grit.

Sri Lanka had never quite produced such a player. His early years were spent learning to adapt to roles as diverse as lower-order rescuer, enforcer, and steady accumulator. By the time he was 25, he was handed the Test and ODI captaincies—an appointment met with scepticism by some but trust by those who saw his growing maturity.

He didn’t disappoint.

2014: An Absolute Purple Patch

Every cricketer has a defining year. For Mathews, it was 2014. It began quietly, with a drawn Test against Pakistan that overlapped the last day of 2013 and spilt into the first week of the new year. But that calm would soon erupt into one of the most remarkable 12-month stretches a Sri Lankan cricketer has ever had.

The Stats:

1160 Test runs at an average of 77.33

Asia Cup title: as captain, delivering match-turning spells and cool-headed finishes.

T20 World Cup win: with Mathews playing a crucial all-round role.

Historic series win in England: anchored by his epic 160 at Headingley.

At Headingley, his innings—under pressure and following a modest first-innings lead—turned the tide. When wickets were falling at the other end, Mathews remained unmoved. He built a 149-run stand with Rangana Herath, pushing Sri Lanka to a 350-run lead, which Prasad and Herath converted into a stunning victory.

This wasn’t just a victory on the scorecard. It was symbolic. It proved that Sri Lanka, even in the post-Jayawardene-Sanga era, could still punch above its weight overseas.

Captain Courageous

Mathews’ captaincy record, at first glance, doesn’t scream greatness. But deeper reflection reveals the scope of his challenge. He captained during the nation’s post-golden generation, a time of financial uncertainty at Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC), constant coaching changes, player revolts, and political interference.

Despite these headwinds, Mathews held the team together. He wasn’t a flashy tactician, but he was instinctive, and more importantly, respected. His leadership reached a crescendo during the 3-0 home whitewash of Australia in 2016, where Sri Lanka’s spinners decimated the opposition and Mathews, as always, contributed across departments.

He may not have screamed or punched the air with every wicket, but his calm, analytical nature gave Sri Lanka breathing room in chaos.

Iconic Performances: A Career in Snapshots

157not out vs Pakistan, Abu Dhabi (2014)

With Sri Lanka trailing by nearly 180, Mathews fought a lone battle, soaking up 343 balls to force a draw—proof of his growing discipline and maturity.

160 vs England, Headingley (2014)

The innings that defined his leadership. With the series on the line, Mathews led from the front and scripted Sri Lanka’s first Test series win in England.

120 not out  vs New Zealand, Wellington (2018)

A statement after being dropped from ODIs over fitness concerns. Along with Kusal Mendis, Mathews batted an entire day and forced a draw through sheer will.

99 vs India (2009) & 199 vs Bangladesh (2022)

The only batter in Test history dismissed on both scores. A cruel symmetry that mirrors a career of near-misses, but also moments of magic.

A Hallmark of Consistency

- 8167 Test runs, 119 matches, 16 centuries, 36 fifties

- Third-highest Test run-getter in Sri Lankan history (after Sangakkara and Jayawardene)

- Scored more than 4000 runs at home, and over 3500 runs abroad—a rare balance in the subcontinent

- Averaged 50+ against Bangladesh, New Zealand, and Pakistan

-  All four Player-of-the-Series awards came away from home

Mathews was Sri Lanka’s most prolific No. 5 and 6 batter between 2013–15, scoring over 2200 runs at an average nearing 58. He was the finisher, the firefighter, and the fulcrum around whom matches spun.

 The Allrounder Who Evolved Beyond Role

As his body gave in and the bowling slowly vanished from his arsenal, Mathews reinvented himself. He became a crisis manager with the bat. Where he once hit sixes to finish games, he began blocking for hours to save them. His unbeaten 120 in Delhi and the push-up celebration after his hundred in Wellington stand as late-career monuments to grit, pride, and understated rebellion.

Angelo Mathews didn’t always get the attention he deserved. He wasn’t always on magazine covers or celebrated like a rockstar. But in dressing rooms across the world, and among teammates from Lasith Malinga to Dhananjaya de Silva, his value was priceless.

A Farewell to the Unshakeable

Mathews ends his Test career not as a firework but a lighthouse—steady, unfazed, illuminating a path forward for a new generation of Sri Lankan cricketers. In a cricketing era increasingly obsessed with instant gratification and flashy strokes, Mathews leaves behind a legacy defined by durability, maturity, and an iron will.

"It wasn't an easy journey – lots of ups and downs," he reflected."But it’s time for the younger players to take the baton and take Sri Lanka forward."

For a man who never made it about himself, that might be the most fitting epitaph of all.

Farewell, Angelo Mathews. You gave it everything. You made it count.

Thank You

Faisal Caesar

Mushfiqur Rahim: The Relentless Constant in Bangladesh’s Cricketing Story

Coming in with Bangladesh in trouble is nothing new for Mushfiqur Rahim. It’s a role he’s embraced since he was a teenager in 2005 — his boyish face and disarming smile belying the grit beneath, the grit of a cricketer who has spent two decades cushioning the tremors of Bangladesh’s batting collapses like a sponge soaking pressure.

That pressure became familiar long before it became routine.

Rahim arrived at a time of strategic upheaval in Bangladesh cricket. In 2005, the selectors — led by a visionary think tank comprising Dav Whatmore, Steve McInnes, and Arafat Rahman — made an audacious call to build for the future. Out went the old guard, despite the criticism of so-called "paid experts"; in came a clutch of raw, untested youth, among whom Mushfiqur was the cornerstone.

That decision would, with time, prove inspired.

A Productive Partnership 

Fast forward to Galle in 2025. Najmul Hossain Shanto had just faced three deliveries when Mushfiqur walked in at 45 for 3 — a precarious yet familiar scenario. On his sixth ball, Shanto danced down the track and lofted one over the bowler’s head, signalling intent. It wasn’t reckless aggression, but a calm defiance. It was as though the innings had inhaled new air.

Despite a pitch that looked flatter than usual on Day 1, Bangladesh resisted the urge to accelerate. Galle demands respect, not bravado. Bat first, bat long. That has long been the script.

Sri Lanka, buoyed by Angelo Mathews’ farewell and Tharindu Rathnayake’s dream debut (including a double-strike in consecutive overs), might have imagined a different story unfolding. But they hadn’t accounted for Mushfiqur and Shanto’s poise.

The pair weathered the storm, punished loose deliveries, and ran with urgency. By lunch on Day 2, Bangladesh had crossed 400. The duo's partnership had swelled to 247 runs — both unbeaten, Shanto on 136, Mushfiqur on 105.

It was Mushfiqur’s 12th Test century, ending a 14-innings drought. And yet, this was no free ride. Dhananjaya de Silva rotated the field shrewdly. Sri Lanka’s bowlers probed, particularly targeting Mushfiqur’s patience. He survived 23 balls in the nineties before nudging into three figures in the 86th over.

For Shanto, it was a return to rhythm — his first Test ton since November 2023. For Mushfiqur, it was a full-circle moment in Galle, where 12 years ago he etched his name in Bangladesh’s history books with the team’s first Test double-century.

A Career of Two Halves

Rahim’s career has been, in many ways, a study in duality.

He debuted before MS Dhoni, Kevin Pietersen, Michael Hussey, and Alastair Cook. Nearly two decades later, he remains the last man standing from the Class of 2005 in active Test cricket. And yet, he has rarely been named in conversations about the greats of the modern era. That is both a disservice and an inevitability.

The first half of his career was marked by promise without potency — 12 Tests in, he averaged under 20. His first Test hundred came in 2010 against India. The next arrived three years later. By the end of 2015, Rahim’s average had clawed its way to 32.31 — decent, but not dazzling.

And then came the pivot.

2017 marked a seismic shift. In Wellington, alongside Shakib Al Hasan, Rahim stitched together a record-breaking 359-run partnership against a formidable New Zealand attack. His 159 — the highest by an Asian wicketkeeper in a SENA country — heralded a new chapter. From that point on, Rahim transformed into one of the most consistent Test performers of his generation.

Since that Wellington innings, he has amassed 3,410 runs in 47 Tests at an average of 44.86. Only four players globally have scored more at a higher average during this span. Rahim’s numbers have outstripped Virat Kohli (44.43), Usman Khawaja (44.35), and Babar Azam (43.82) in that period — a stunning metric for a man often left out of elite lists.

And yet, perception lags behind reality.

Limited by Circumstance, Not by Skill

Rahim’s ascent has been constrained by the asymmetries of Test cricket. He has played only 14 Tests in SENA countries, averaging 21.92. Six of those came after 2017 — two in New Zealand, where he averaged 94.50, and four in South Africa, where he struggled at 19. No Tests in England or Australia since 2016. Even in Bangladesh, SENA opposition has been sporadic.

That uneven exposure has distorted the perception of Rahim’s quality. The weight given to performances in SENA countries remains the litmus test for batting greatness. And Rahim has had neither the platform nor the privileges to make that case fully.

What he has done is maximize every controllable within his grasp.

Since 2017, his home and away averages are strikingly consistent: 43.93 and 46.15. His centuries span the globe — from Galle to Rawalpindi, Hyderabad to Wellington. At home, he has flourished: three unbeaten scores over 175, including two double centuries. Since 2020, his Test average of 46.42 eclipses Steve Smith’s 46.17 — a quiet, almost ironic, footnote in cricket's statistical archives.

A Legacy Cast in Grit, Not Glamour

Rahim has always been a cricketer's cricketer. Understated. Uncelebrated. Yet unmistakably elite. His skill against spin is matched by few. His glove work may have often taken a back seat to his batting, but it was never unworthy. In hindsight, had he relinquished the gloves earlier, he might have soared higher with the bat. But Rahim chose devotion over convenience.

He has been criticized for wearing his heart on his sleeve — sometimes too tightly. The emotional strain of carrying Bangladesh’s middle order and the added burden of wicketkeeping may have exacted a toll. But that emotional core also fuelled his longevity, his resilience, and his quiet dominance.

Mushfiqur Rahim will perhaps never be counted among the pantheon of global greats. But within the context of Bangladesh cricket — and indeed, the global narrative of undervalued brilliance — he stands tall.

Not every great player makes headlines. Some, like Rahim, make history — quietly, persistently, and with unwavering grace.

Thank You 

Faisal Caesar