Shakib’s Test captaincy all but uncertain
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|| CF Correspondent ||
Ace Bangladesh all-rounder Shakib al Hasan return as a Test captain is anything but certain despite the fact he will come back into the national side soon after his suspension ends.
Shakib, who returned to the country in the early hours of Wednesday after having departed five months ago for the United States, is now in the final two months of his year-long suspension from the game.
He is likely to begin his road to redemption in international cricket with the Tigers' upcoming Sri Lanka series in October-November while his suspension, which was imposed on October 29 last year, reduced the strength of the Tigers in Test/
After Shakib's ban, the Tigers played two Tests against India and one against Pakistan, and without their regular Test skipper, they ended up losing all the matches by an innings.
Stand-in skipper Mominul Haque could hardly fill Shakib's shoes in those matches and the added responsibility had an adverse effect on his batting as he failed to notch even a fifty in both tours.
Mominul did improve his captaincy record a bit by leading the side to a win against Zimbabwe at home where he even scored a hundred and the board now has to decide if it wants to give Mominul an extended run as captain or hand the captaincy back to the experienced Shakib.
Chief selector Minhajul Abedin dodged answering this tricky question, by saying the selectors have no say in who becomes the captain.
‘’Captaincy is completely the BCB's and cricket operations decision. The selection panel doesn't make this decision,' Minhajul told reporters at Mirpur on Wednesday.
The schedule of the three-Test series against Sri Lanka was yet to be finalised but the preliminary starting date of the first Test is October 24, meaning Shakib would be eligible to play from the second Test.
