Women Cricketers eyes 2 wins in W-T20 WC
Image : Getty
|| CF Correspondent ||
Bangladesh women’s Twenty20 captain Salma Khatun on Sunday said that they were targeting to win at least two group stage matches during the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup in order to avoid playing qualifiers again for the next edition of the tournament.
The women’s team left for Brisbane on Sunday to take part in the forthcoming edition of ICC.
Women’s T20 World Cup, scheduled to take place in Australia from February 21 to March 8.
Bangladesh is facing tough opponents in the round-robin league games. Pre-tournament favorite India and Australia is in the same group with New Zealand and Srilanka is in the same group.
This is the fourth successive time Bangladesh women’s team are competing in the tournament since making their maiden appearance in 2014 when they hosted the event.
The women’s team became runners-up in 2015 ICC Women’s World Twenty20 Qualifier while they finished champions during the 2017 and 2019 Qualifiers to progress to the main event.
‘Actually we are targeting not to play in the qualifying matches anymore for Twenty20 World Cup. We needed to win maximum two matches and we are aiming for it before going to play in the World Cup,’ Salma told reporters prior to their departure.
Experienced all-rounder Jahanara Alam expressed her satisfaction with the kind of preparation they got and hoped that the two-week long conditioning camp in Australia would help them complete their preparation well.
‘Actually we are lagging a bit behind in our batting. We have some weakness in spin-balls. We have worked on this matter. We have practiced under machine and throw down. We also practiced against boys in the nets,’ she said.
‘Overall we have a good preparation. We are going there 13-days ahead of the tournament and I think the conditioning camp will help us a lot,’ she added.
Bangladesh will play three tour matches against local teams on February 7, 10 and 12 respectively during their 10-day conditioning camp in Gold Coast before they shift to ICC facilities.
The women’s team will then play two ICC mandated practice matches against Thailand and Pakistan on February 16 and 20 respectively before facing India in their first Group A match on February 24 in Perth.
Bangladesh will then face hosts Australia in Canberra on February 27 and New Zealand on February 29 in Melbourne.
Bangladesh women’s team never competed against Australia and New Zealand in Twenty20 internationals in their cricketing history.
Bangladesh will play their final group-phase match against Sri Lanka on March 2 in Melbourne.
The top-two teams of the five-team group will then move onto the semi-finals of the 10-team tournament.
Both semi-finals will be played on March 5 in Sydney and the final will take place on March 8 in Melbourne.
