||CF Correspondent||

Bangladesh skipper Mahmudullah said on Tuesday that they were in two minds against Neil Wagner and added that they have to bat with lot more purpose if they want to do well in the last Test and added that he firmly believes his batsmen have the ability to play better.

On both, the Test matches visitors were caught by the pace unit of New Zealand as they began to dictate terms precisely Neil Wagner with his short bowling.

Since his Test debut in 2012, Neil Wagner, the New Zealand pacer, has bent his back time and again to pepper the opposition ranks with a barrage of well-directed short deliveries and found success. His sustained short-ball tactics once again came to the fore when he dismantled Bangladesh's batting unit in the just-concluded Wellington Test and ended up with nine scalps in the match.

Wagner's success of using the short ball can be capitalised by the point that 15 of his 16 wickets in the series have come through his tried and tested formula. The way Bangladesh crumbled against Wagner's strategy in both the Tests also opened up a slew of questions on their ability to play the short ball.

“We have to bat with more guts for longer periods. A number of our batsmen are playing half-hearted shots, or we are not committed. We are in two minds whether to play a shot or not. You need to back yourself. If you want to attack, you should know how you want to cope with their bouncer theory,’’ said Mahmudullah.

“In the first innings, Tamim and Shadman gave us a good start and even after Wagner started with his bouncer theory, we were handling him well but then we gave it away,” he said.

“We knew about him from the last time we were here. Now we are talking a lot about the Wagner factor. There was certainly help in the pitches for both sets of pace bowlers but we couldn't utilize it as well as they did. I believe that our batsmen have the skill level to handle their short-ball tactics,’’ he said.