The chief selector of Bangladesh Minhajul Abedin has revealed that the decision to send Soumya Sarkar to West Indies for the T20I series was made after the insistence of the team management.

Sarkar hasn’t been in the best of forms after bursting to the scene in 2015. Indeed, he has just one half-century in 9 T20I games that he played this year and has made only 119 runs at an average of a paltry 13.22.

As a result, according to Minhajul Abedin, they were in a bit of a quandary with regards to the selection of the dashing left-handed batsman. However, after consultations with the team management, they decided to send him to West Indies for the T20I series.

‘We have sent Soumya Sarkar and Ariful Haque [to West Indies] for the T20I series. We, the selectors, like Ariful but Soumya Sarkar’s form put us in a bit of doubt.

‘The team management, in this regard, wanted Soumya a lot. We always pay attention to what the team management has to say regarding the selection policy. Their insistence led to Soumya’s selection.'

Minjahul Abedin also stated that the selectors had a different plan for Soumya Sarka wherein he would represent Bangladesh A team against Ireland but also justified his selection for the West Indies T20I series by claiming that the southpaw bats well on foreign conditions.

‘We had a different plan regarding Soumya Sarkar, there is a lot of games for the [Bangladesh] A team. He played against Sri Lanka A and I hope that he will return to form.’

‘He [Soumya] played well enough in foreign condition. He plays well on bouncy wickets. He hasn’t scored many runs in the last 8 months, which hampered us a lot. The wicket in West Indies is bouncy and the one in Florida is quicker, which is why the management wanted him in the team.’