Bangladesh: Cricketers concerned (27 Sep 1998)

27 September 1998

Cricketers concerned

The Daily Star

Cricketers' Forum has issued a statement in a response to Tanveer Haider's article, Daily Star, 25 Sept 1998. - Sports Editor

Cricketers' Forum is deeply concerned by the snowballing effects of the national cricket team's performance and its aftermath. Whilst the media and the general public are free to draw their own conclusions and make them public knowledge, it is somewhat disconcerting to find responsible and highly placed office bearers of the Bangladesh Cricket Board making public statements, the contents and nature of which will only serve to further damage and tarnish the image and credibility of not only our cricket but also the sole regulatory body in the country, namely the BCB itself, says a press release signed by its president Mainul Haq.

We are shocked that the Bangladesh team manager has chosen to make public his private opinions in the public media, even before his tour report was submitted to the BCB. Whether or not he is at all empowered to divulge and express such sentiments in his present capacity as not only team manager, but also one of the Vice-President of the BCB, and whether or not a code of conduct relevant in such circumstances is also applicable to him, are issues that are essentially between himself and the Board to settle. What the general public and legions of cricketers have been left to conclude is that of a supposedly responsible official trying his level best to distance himself from the team and its results, by heaping total blame on the players.

What is singularly unfortunate is that those players who have been accused of wrongdoing, including the captain himself, have not been able to put forward their versions of the story or even defend themselves, bound as they certainly are by their own code of conduct. The press would have done well to cross check the team manager's utterances with those of the players before dropping this bombshell on an unsuspecting public.

On the eve of the ACC Trophy is Nepal the team manager's remarks are bound to have a profoundly demoralising effect on the players. We are surprised this fact was not taken into consideration at all by the concerned individual. The team manager has insisted that backed up by thirty years experience as player and organiser whatever he has said is in the interest of Bangladesh cricket.

No Mr Manager, with over thirty years of experience, you were expected to know better than to publicly speak your mind on issues, which should have been best placed before your peers in the BCB, behind closed doors. Mr Manager, in spite of your thirty years of experience what you have done was not in the interest of Bangladesh cricket, rather very much to its detriment.

We would therefore urge all concerned in positions of power in Bangladesh cricket to refrain from issuing any further damaging statements. National interest must be kept above attempts at self aggrandisement and efforts to garner cheap publicity and popularity on an individual basis.

Source :: The Bangladesh Daily Star (https://www.dailystarnews.com)