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From: Mohit Malik. Anoova Consulting <mohit.malik@AnoovaConsulting.Biz>
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/09/18/sports/cricket.php
CRICKETUnlikely nation at center of mounting tug-of-war
*By Huw Richards<http://www.iht.com/cgi-bin/search.cgi?query=By%20Huw%20Richards&sort=publicationdate&submit=Search>
*
Published: September 18, 2008
After eight years of feeling unwanted, Bangladeshi cricket is finding that
the alternative is not necessarily preferable.
It has struggled for acceptance since playing its first test match, against
India in November 2000. Most opponents have agreed fixtures in a spirit of
contract compliance, fulfilling minimum obligations under the International
Cricket Council's Future Tour Program, rather than really wanting to play
the 10th and newest test nation. Bangladesh has played only 53 five-day
tests, losing 47 and winning only 1. Its players have similarly not been
wanted for overseas engagements like contracts with English county teams,
which both underline status and improve skills.
But suddenly, they are in demand. Thirteen have signed up for the rebel
Indian Cricket League, or ICL, forming a new Dhaka Warriors franchise based
in the Bangladeshi capital for the league's second season, which starts on
Oct. 10. The team will be led by Habibul Bashar, the former captain of
Bangladesh and highest run-scorer in five-day tests.
This places Bangladesh on the front line of a battle between the two
competing Indian leagues set up to play in the fashionable Twenty20 format
of the game: the ICL and the India Premier League, which is backed by the
Board of Control for Cricket in India and recognized by the International
Cricket Council. Setting up the Dhaka franchise is an aggressive move by the
ICL, which hopes to tap the huge potential fan base in a nation of 150
million people. However, it means alienating the Bangladeshi cricket
authorities by going head-to-head with official matches - one-day
internationals and five-day tests against New Zealand that start Oct. 9.
The Bangladesh Cricket Board has taken a hard line against the players,
announcing 10-year bans, intended as a deterrent to others, on Wednesday.
They are not the first to suffer for an ICL connection. The leading New
Zealand fast bowler Shane Bond lost his national team contract when he
signed with the ICL earlier in the year. The English county team Kent
qualified for the Champions League - a world championship for the best
Twenty20 teams of leading cricket nations - but was excluded because it had
two players who had appeared in the ICL.
In imposing the bans, Bangladesh is not just sending out a warning to its
own players, but aligning itself firmly with the Board of Control for
Cricket in India, cricket's richest and most powerful national body, which
is determined to crush the ICL and has pushed hard for sanctions against it.
In the short term, though, the limited strength of Bangladesh will be
depleted further. Three of the 13 - all-rounder Alok Kapali, wicket-keeper
Dhiman Ghosh and fast-medium bowler Farhad Reza - played in the most recent
international match, a one-dayer against Australia earlier this month. And
three more - batsmen Aftab Ahmad and Shahriar Nafees and spin-bowler
Mohammed Rafique - played in its last five-day test against South Africa in
February, although Rafique, Bangladesh's record wicket-taker in tests, then
announced his retirement.
Bangladesh officials rejected any suggestion that the losses would
jeopardize the country's status as a test nation. Politically, the hard line
may even have helped secure it by keeping the Board of Control for Cricket
in India and other ruling bodies happy. It does mean, though, that
international cricket's weakest team just got that much weaker. Kapali is a
player of considerable, though unfulfilled, promise. Nafees, who has been
seen as a future captain, is still only 22 and talented enough to have
played an innings of 138 against Australia. Ghosh is not yet 21 and in his
first year of international cricket. Potentially significant international
careers may just have been truncated, and no country can afford this less.
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