World Cup is a damp squib for Bangladesh (25 April 1999)

25 April 1999

World Cup is a damp squib for Bangladesh

Scyld Berry

JUST as every family is unhappy in its own way, so do most World Cup countries seem to be at the moment. If the trouble does not lie in a player convicted of rape, as in South Africa's case, then it is a board in uproar, like Sri Lanka's, or a coach suddenly resigning, like Javed Miandad, which surely reduces the chances of Pakistan.

Bangladesh are unhappy because they arrived in England 10 days ago, having seen enough of flooding in their own country, and have yet to bat or bowl out of doors. They have already been cast as the rank outsiders of the competition, even below Scotland. Whoever said time spent in reconnaissance is never wasted obviously was not stuck in a nondescript hotel for a fortnight beside the Watford bypass trying to play cricket in the soggiest of Aprils.

It is just as well therefore that the Bangladeshis are polite newcomers to international cricket (they were given one-day international status in 1997). If England had been subjected to 10 days of acclimatisation in a strange country without anything more than an indoor net - even allowing for the galaxy of delights Watford can offer - they would have screamed the place down.

The Bangladeshis' attempts to play cricket yesterday would have been laughable if they had not been sad. All week they had been hoping for their first match: first it was going to be Barnet, which then turned out to be Barnes, which then turned out to be not a match at all but practice in the middle among themselves - until a morning call came and even that was rained off.

The glamour of cricket's seventh World Cup was not fully evident at this point. At 11am the players boarded their team coach and set off in search of some - any - green space. Their hotel brightly suggested Aldenham Country Park, which the Bangladeshis tried, but the ideal form of World Cup work-out does not consist of walking round a lake, feeding ducks and following a nature trail. "They did not want us to come before May 3," remarked the Bangladeshis' manager Tanvir Islam, amiably, "but teams like us and Kenya, we need time to get used to the cold and wetness."

So the bus set off again and they tried the Metropolitan Police's sports ground at Bushey. There was nobody in the clubhouse to meet or greet them. The fields lay as if ready for paddy in the Delta back home. Even the bouncy castle for the children of the Met was deflated.

Still, the World Cup trail has to start somewhere and so it did here for the Bangladeshis under their coach Gordon Greenidge, and his two temporary assistants, former Pakistani all-rounder Mushtaq Mohammed, who is looking after the spinners, and Alan Ward, who bowled fast for England once - even twice - and could now pass for a bearded ageing rock star.

As they ran and trained, not all the Bangladeshis exhibited the physiques or competitive desire of professionals, some of them just clubbies exposed to the big time and the possibility of humiliation. Their old-sweat coaches drove themselves harder, especially Greenidge, who, for all the rumours of his dismissal, is contracted until the end of June when his position will be reviewed.

A few of the younger players, however, have the demeanour of professionals and a promising future. Bangladesh's under-19s defeated England and the West Indies in the last Youth World Cup, and this supply should continue now that their board sponsors cricket in 800 of the country's schools.

But as Islam explains, too many of these promising players leave for higher education abroad, especially North America, and play cricket no more. They need Test status - it is to be discussed at the International Cricket Council meeting this summer - but when?

Making Bangladesh the 10th Test country would also create a bloc of four from the Asian sub-continent which would tend to dominate other, older powers in the ICC. It may be no coincidence their reception here has not been the warmest.

Javed Miandad yesterday attended a reception for Pakistan's World Cup team hosted by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in Islamabad, despite resigning as coach last week. However, it is unclear whether he is back with the side.

"I went to the reception at PCB's invitation because I was part of the squad that recently won in India and Sharjah," Miandad said.

The Pakistan Cricket Board's council will meet on May 1 and 2 to consider Miandad's resignation and possible replacement.

Source :: Electronic Telegraph (https://www.telegraph.co.uk)