We can excel anywhere in the world: Mortaza

After having defeated teams like Zimbabwe, West Indies, New Zealand and Pakistan in the bilateral ODI series, the recent series triumph against India is surely the biggest achievement of the Bangladesh cricket team. This victory has made the Bangladesh ODI skipper, Mashrafe Mortaza, feel confident that his team can go and perform to their full potential in any part of the world. Many cricketing experts have also said that apart from home wins, Bangladesh should now aim at winning abroad. Only then can they afford to boast about their good form and performances.

Talking about the same issue, Mashrafe said, “You see, everyone has to struggle abroad. The conditions in Australia and New Zealand were not easy for us but we did well in the World Cup. Everyone of us has that confidence. This team can play their best anywhere in the world. We can succeed in any condition.” He also talked about the loss against India in the final match of the three-match series and termed it as disheartening. He blamed his batsmen for the 77-run loss against India that prevented them from achieving a whitewash.

“We were ahead of India until the 35th over. We had only lost two wickets more but we had no problem chasing the target. We could have scored even 90 runs in the last 10 overs if we had four-five wickets in hand”, Mortaza said. He talked about how not being able to make a big score from the beginning landed the batsmen in trouble. He added, “Everyone from number two to seven got out scoring 20-25 runs. We needed one to make 80 and another to score 60. Then the game would have been better. On the whole, we have made a big mistake. We are yet to learn how to chase well.”

Feeling extremely delighted with the winagainst India, Mashrafe concluded by saying – “If you leave aside the achievement in the World Cup, this is the best. We didn’t win a series against teams ranked one to four. A win against them, I’ll say this is the best. And we will learn from what we’ve lost. We’ll be able to handle such situation in the future.”

Heres wishing the team the best of luck in series to come.

Edited by Aashna Bakshi