• Source:JND

Bangladesh has accused the International Cricket Council (ICC) of unjust treatment, citing a difficult travel schedule that hindered their performance in the ongoing Under-19 World Cup in Zimbabwe and Namibia.

The team was eliminated from the semi-finals after suffering a defeat to England in the Super Six match.

Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) game development coordinator Habibul Bashar said that the ICC's hasty changes to the venues pushed the team to travel extensively, affecting their preparations.

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Bangladesh's U19 team started their World Cup run in Bulawayo, facing a defeat to India on January 17 and their next match against New Zealand was washed out on January 20. They regrouped to beat USA in Harare on January 23, securing a spot in the Super Six round.

“More than the approach, I think our calculations were lacking [against England and India]. But this [travel schedule] is something I want to highlight, even if people think I’m making excuses," Bashar was quoted as saying by The Daily Star.

Notably, Bashar said the BCB had to finance an internal flight to avoid exhausting the players before their match against India.

“To avoid the boys getting too tired before the India match, the BCB actually paid for an internal flight out of its own pocket because the bus journey was too long and direct flights were scarce," Bashar claimed.

Bashar claimed that the team had alerted the ICC about the exhausting travel schedule, but their matters were ignored.

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“The schedule was very unfair to us. During the initial schedule, we were supposed to play two of our warm-up matches in Masvingo and travel to Bulawayo, which is a four-hour drive, for our opening two group-stage matches. Later, they [ICC] suddenly changed the schedule, and it meant we had to play two of our warm-up games at different venues, travelling back and forth," Bashar said.

“We notified them [of the travel burden] before the tournament started. We asked them to move our practice games to avoid the back-and-forth travel, but they didn’t listen. Once the tournament starts, you can’t really change these things," he added.


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