|| CF Correspondent ||
Bangladesh Game Development Chairman Khaled Mahmud told reporters that he is disappointed not to execute his plans with ICC Under-19 World Cup winner.
While the Bangladesh team had gone through hard times in the recent past it was the Under-19 team that came with the light of hope by winning the first-ever ICC tournament the Under-19 World Cup for the country.
Crazy people of the country got relieved watching their future cricketers in the right shape while after winning the U-19 World Cup the door of improvement and do more better performance was opened for Akbar, Mahmudul and Rakibul.
Bangladesh Cricket Board had their own plans but due to the coronavirus, they are now standstill like every other thing in the world.
BCB announced earlier that they are going to make the squad of Under-21 combining with this Under-19 team member though it was not decided at that time about their plan of action.
Mahmud, who is known to be the architect behind the success of the Under-19 cricketers, clearly look dejected that his plan with his charges is stalled for the moment as he feels that if he could execute his plans it would have been a perfect pathway for the youngster to breathe on the shoulders in the national dressing room.
"Our plan with these boys is basically five months a year. They will play in Dhaka League, NCL, BCL, BPL. They will be busy for six to seven months with this matches all around. I wanted to keep them in tight training schedule for the remaining five months of the off-season. June to October - this is the time I targeted. But now everything is stopped because of the corona,’’ said Mahmud.
We wanted to train them with a foreign coach at the Mirpur Academy, not just that. I wanted to give them as much exposure as possible by providing them with more competitive matches as it would have helped them test their ability in different conditions,’’ he said adding that how he wanted to keep the Under-21 squad out of the country rather than in the country.
"I wanted them to play matches abroad for three or three and a half month out of five months and wanted to send them for a tour to England in the June-July. Then to Pakistan for five or seven-match ODI series and the last one month in Australia to play three-four-day matches and one five day match,’’ he said.
According to Mahmud, it would have been more like an educational program and he was assured by the BCB president that he will receive all kinds of logistical support for the young Tigers.
“I wanted them to put under a county team in England. Can't put them in a five-star hotel for two months. I wanted to rent an apartment and the boys would be in the bunk beds. Get used to the difficulties of life. I would have sent a cook as well along with them so that they don't have to face any kind of problem with food,’’ said Mahmud adding that he had a vision of training them with some specialist coach during this time frame and had different camps for 15 to 20 days and then send the Under-21 team as a high-performance squad on a tour to Pakistan-Australia.
‘’The boys will play as a team, also will play id different minor clubs of county, we would have managed that. These boys have won the World Cup by playing with same-age boys. Now, let them lose some matches by playing older boys than them. There is no problem with that. Being accustomed to different conditions is good for countries cricket,’’ he said.
“I talked with Papon[ Nazmul] Bhai on this. He says to make the program budget. Spending two months in England will cost BDT one crore. Two and a half or three crore BDT will cost in this whole five months program. I was working on these. But in the meantime, everything got stuck because of corona,’’ he said.
‘’June is not too late. There is also some formality to made with the England-Pakistan-Australia cricket boards. When will our board open, when will we be able to do this works, whether we can do it or not in this year, who knows,’’ he added.
