Youth Tigers to travel India in March

Bangladesh Cricket Board’s (BCB) Games Development (GD) will call up its Bangladesh Under-19 Cricket outfit for a week-long training camp ahead of their away series against its Afghanistan counterparts.

Youth Tigers are scheduled to fly to Dehradun, India on March 10 to play the international series against its Asian rival. The bilateral series comprises a five-match one-day youth series along with a four-day match.

It is learnt from the GD sources that the youth Tigers earlier held an 84-day practice at different venues across the country amid the concern of the Covid-19 since August, 2020.

Of these, the youth Tigers held a seven-week training camp at BKSP, two weeks in Sylhet, one week in Chattogram and two weeks in Cox’s Bazar venues of Sheikh Kamal International Cricket Stadium and its Academy Ground beside the world’s largest sea beach.

This time the GD has planned to recall a total of 22 players to have practised at the BCB-National Cricket Academy (NCA) ground of the Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium (SBNCS) in Mirpur.

They will hold an intense week-long practice under the supervision of the head coach Naveed Nawaz, fitness trainer Richard Stainer along with local coaching staff like Talha Jubair, Mehrab Hossain Opi and Mohammad Selim.

BCB-Games Development Senior National Manager AEM Kawser said in this regard that they were trying to arrange a series for their youth Tigers ahead of the 2022 ICC Under19 Cricket World Cup but could not manage it because of the corona pandemic.

“We have been communicating with different cricket boards for so long to arrange a series for the youth Tigers. We were keeping in touch with them,” AEM Kawser said.

“We finally managed to rope in Afghanistan, who will host us in Dehradun, where they set up their base to run their cricketing activities. We will fly to Dehradun, India on March 10 if everything is okay,” Kawser told media.   

The series the youth Tigers will play in Dehradun in March which will be its first overseas tour for them after over 11-month protracted corona-enforced layoff.

With the consent and direct support of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), Afghanistan set their base-camp in Dehradun from where they have been running their cricket smoothly regardless of the national, ‘A’ team, Emerging team and age-level cricket team.

Using the foreign venues especially venues from India, Afghanistan meanwhile achieved an awe-making progress and development along with establishing them as an uprising cricket nation in Asian continent as well as a force to be reckoned with.

As of now, the top-notch teams have to make a second thought to beat them in the cricket field or have to give a tough fight to beat them in a shorter version of the game.