Bangladesh faced a 1-0 defeat in the Test series opener at home, and head coach Russell Domingo left scratching his head over what went wrong in the batting.
Bangladesh faced a 1-0 defeat in the Test series opener at home, and head coach Russell Domingo left scratching his head over what went wrong in the batting.
On a batting-friendly wicket, Bangladesh was 24/5 in the first innings and 23/4 in the second innings which resulted in Bangladesh losing the Test match by ten wickets.
Domingo was worried about the consistent collapses in the batting unit but couldn’t figure out the fact that is affecting it.
“If we knew the answer, it probably wouldn’t happen,”
he said on Friday (May 27).
“We have to do something different, whether it is to change the order around. We can look at one or two things.
“You won’t win Tests from 24-5 and 23-4 in both innings. We have to change something. It has happened too many times in the last 6-8 months. There’s no use of me going in there and shouting and screaming at everyone, saying they are terrible. I have to build their confidence so that we can win some Tests in West Indies.
“Batters have to prepare well, as we did before New Zealand. Be willing to leave balls. They have to go back to old-fashioned Test match batting. At the moment, it is not working for us. We need to look at the batting order. If we do the same thing, we will get the same result.”
The head coach acknowledged that the team needs to start producing effective results for a cultural shift towards the Test cricket.
“The cultural shift will only take place when you have some good results,”
he said.
“The desire and want to play Test when we win a big Test series. Before this Test series, I challenged the guys if they ever won a Test against a top-tier nation besides Zimbabwe. The answer was no, they have never beaten any of the top sides. I thought the sides matched up evenly. We won the toss. We started badly but got into a good position. We let it slip once again. Until we start winning those big series, not just one-off Tests, the Test culture is going to struggle to go to the next level.
“Small things (that need to be changed). It is the way capping ceremonies take place. It is the value that gets put on – whether monetary or status placed on a Test player versus a white-ball player. It is the crowds that attend, the media focus. There’s a lot more focus on white-ball cricket from every aspect than there is in Test match cricket. It is a whole-hearted refurbishment that needs to be around the Test match system.”
Domingo also pointed out that making spin-friendly wickets on the home tracks is not the solution or the answer to changing the tide.
“It might help you in a one-off Test match, but it is not going to help in the long-run development of the Test team. With all due respect to past Tests, those may have hurt us going forward,”
he said.
“When we get on good pitches, and I am a big advocate of playing on good pitches, we come second. If we feel that we have to do doctor pitches, then we have no chance away from home.
“These two were good pitches. The reason they are not is that they are so used to playing on bad pitches. Playing on good pitches will mean better development in the long run. I know everyone wants to win. I know a quick fix is them getting 100, we get 110. But the team is not going to get better that way. I understand that those series were one-all, they didn’t win the series. It is a catch-22 situation.”