Dhaka Metro will have some advantages: Arafat Sunny
|| CF Correspondent ||
Bangladesh spinner Arafat Sunny, who will be playing for the star-studded Dhaka Metropolis in the upcoming National Cricket League [NCL], thinks that his side will be mentally ahead considering they have many national team players in the team.
“I think that whoever gives the best on the field, is the best player,” the spinner said. “There are many national team players here [in the NCL]. But if we do not perform on the field then it doesn’t have any value. If someone from outside the national team is performing, then it is also a big achievement. So wherever we play, there are many experienced players, we hope everyone will play at their best.
“But yes, there will be some advantages, because we have more experience than the local players. We will try to apply them.”
NCL, the country’s first-class domestic competition, is set to start next month and the teams are going to experience a change in format in the upcoming season. The new decision will allow the teams to bat for only up to 120 overs in their first innings is expected to make the tournament more competitive as, in the past, a few teams used bat for hours with the results ending up in no-one’s favor.
Sunny has welcomed this decision as the batters will look to score more runs in the limited overs and that will open a way for the bowlers to claim wickets, even on the batting-friendly pitches.
He said: “It will be beneficial definitely. Because a lot of times it is seen that a team keeps batting. The weak teams, on the other hand, keeps bowling all day long. If this [change in format] happens, the competition [between the teams] will increase.
“After settling in on the wicket, the urge to score runs will increase. And it will be positive for the bowlers as well. Because wickets are very batting-friendly at times. In this [newly introduced] rule, the batsman will have to score quick runs after a certain time. And our wicket-taking chances will increase.”
Four of Dhaka Metropolis’ six matches ended in a draw last season with one of the other two being abandoned. The team finished third in the second tier of the tournament as the rain-curtailed matches did not allow them to achieve their goal of getting promoted to Tier 1 last season. According to Sunny, the team perform to with the same goal this time.
“There are tiers in the tournament – Tier 2, Tier 1. Our goal will be to get into Tier 1. [We] had the same goal last year, but it could not happen for rain,” said the 31-year-old.
