Mashrafe questions BCB's coach hiring process

There have been lots of arguments going on among the cricket fraternity about whether Russel Domingo is the right man to coach the Bangladesh cricket team and should be stripped of his role. Now,  Bangladesh's former ODI skipper Mashrafe Bin Mortaza has questioned Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB)'s coach hiring process.

Mashrafe, who has been away from international cricket since March last year, posted a status on his personal Facebook profile last night raising several concerns regarding Bangladesh's coach hiring process.

"I really want to know what the process behind hiring a coach in our country," Mashrafe wrote. 

"When a new coach is interviewed at the time of hiring, what questions does he exactly face? Or is there any question at all? Do they just want to know what new the upcoming coach will bring with him and when they find some exciting answers, the board hires that coach. I guess this is where the mistake is made. We are always looking for high profile coaches to convince people, but they turn out to be of no use later on. We need people who know our cricket culture or at least have studied it," the post further read. 

Mashrafe said a coach should know Bangladesh's cricketing culture before he comes here for coaching, according to him, this is the most important part. If he is not aware of it, he will never understand what it took to make the likes of Shakib, Tamim, Mushfi or Mustafiz. They will even ignore their contribution to the team. 

Mashrafe then indirectly pointed at the recent incident of Mushfiqur Rahim's giving up wicket keeping in T20I cricket which created a buzz among the cricket fraternity. 

"A player will rightly be dropped from the side if he doesn't perform well. Everyone goes through a bad patch. But the humiliation from team management is only possible in our country," Mashrafe said. 

"I've worked with 9-10 coaches so far in my cricketing career, and I've seen everyone coming in and working in their own way, which is pretty normal. But what creates chaos is favouritism. Every coach selects one or two favourite players of his own and that creates divisions in the dressing room and also complicates the players-coach relationship," Mashrafe added. 

Mashrafe also pointed out that these coaches earn 12-15 lakhs BDT per month while our local coaches find it hard to survive. And as soon as these foreign coaches get better offers from other teams or franchise sides, they don't think twice before leaving. The real heroes, according to Mashrafe, the local coaches, remain behind the limelight without proper opportunities. Then comes a new coach and the cycle continues.

Mashrafe concluded his Facebook post mentioning our cricket team need a coach of our own. These foreign coaches will come and go and try to work in their own way, but Bangladesh cricket needs a coach who understands our cricket. 

"We don't need high-profile coaches. We need a coach of our own," he concluded.