Mushfiq calls on Bangladesh to do the basics right
DHAKA (92 News) - The in-form Mushfiqur Rahim said Bangladesh have suffered in the first two ODIs against Sri Lanka owing to their failures in executing the basics.
Rahim has waged lone battles with the bat in the first two ODIs against Sri Lanka in Colombo's R Premadasa Stadium, posting scores of 67 and 98* in the two defeats so far. In both games the Bangladesh top-order has suffered failures, getting reduced to 39/4 and 68/4, respectively.
Rahim feels it's a case of the basics not being executed correctly. "I think we first need to work on keeping it simple and keep the basics right... With the bat, I think we need to play to our strength and whoever gets set, has to make sure he goes big."
The batting failures aside, Rahim feels Bangladesh's bowlers haven't been quite up to the mark either. His near-century in the second game lifted the side to a somewhat competitive 238/8 on a slowing wicket, but Sri Lanka were able to chase the total down with seven wickets and 32 balls to spare.
"I thought it's a challenging score if we bowl the first 10 overs really well. But we couldn't do that because we had given so many easy boundaries. They knew that later it would be very difficult to score on that track, and we had an extra spinner playing. So, I think the first 10 overs with the batting and bowling lost us the game." The series already conceded, Rahim hopes Bangladesh can learn from how Sri Lanka have done so far to turn the tables in the final game, as it will serve as a morale-booster going into future assignments. "[Sri Lanka] played normal basic cricket and we couldn't do that. So, that's one of the key areas that we can take as a lesson from the last two games. We still have one more game to be played and hopefully, we will win the next match and take the momentum for the couple of series back home."Sri Lanka secured their first home ODI series win since 2015 with victory over Bangladesh!#SLvBAN REPORT 👇https://t.co/ZCkRGxcBiC
— ICC (@ICC) July 29, 2019
