Asia Cup 2018: 4 Bangladeshi players to keep an eye on
The Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) announced their 16-man squad for the Asia Cup that is set to kick off from 15 September in the UAE. Bangladesh have done very little of note in the previous editions, failing to win the tournament even once, despite making the final on two occasions.
This time around things might be a bit different. Mashrafe Mortaza and his team start off their campaign against Sri Lanka. The island nation, 5-time winners of the competition have fallen off the radar in recent times but still, start as the favourites to make it to the next round.
The Tigers have had a woeful record against the Islanders, having won only 6 matches out of 44. Times are changing, having beaten Sri Lanka by 163 runs at the start of the year.
In this list, we look at 4 Bangladeshi Players, who really deserve extra attention in the prestigious tournament:
#4 Mushfiqur Rahim
Mushfiqur Rahim is definitely one of the best batsmen that Bangladesh has ever produced, and he is getting better by the day. Mushfiq has bagged plenty of runs around the globe. He had saved his side from many embarrassing defeats, even converting some of them into historic victories.
Despite the recent poor form, where he failed to score even a single fifty versus the West Indies, Mushfiq remains as the lynchpin of the Bangladeshi middle-order, who can one-handedly change the fortune of a match.
During the last 12 months, Bangladesh have played a total of 11 ODIs. During this period, Mushfiq has scored 430 runs at an average of 47.77 with three half-centuries and a century to his name. This record is bettered only by Tamim Iqbal.
Mushfiq’s vast experience of playing 187 ODIs and scoring 4828 runs with 5 century and 29 centuries could be the best fuel for Bangladesh to fulfil their Asia Cup dream.