Bangladesh team return home after disappointing T20 WC campaign

Bangladesh national team returned home on Monday night after a disappointing T20 World Cup campaign, even though result-wise it was their best performance in this event so far.

Apart from captain Shakib, vice-captain Sohan, and allrounder Mehidy Hasan Miraz, all of the players returned home. Shakib went to the USA to spend time with his family while the other two players stayed in Australia. The coaching staff of the team was given a break as they returned to their respective country straight from Australia.

As per the contract, the T20 World Cup was technical consultant Sridharan Sriram's last assignment.  The Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) is yet to decide whether he would be given a long run.

BCB Cricket Operations Chairman Jalal Younus said Sriram's matter will be decided within the shortest possible time.

In the main round of the last seven editions of this World Cup, Bangladesh had just one victory, that too against West Indies in the inaugural edition of the tournament in 2007. But in the eighth T20 World Cup itself, Bangladesh achieved two victories, which came against Netherlands and Zimbabwe.

Still, the campaign was termed as disappointing given the fact that Bangladesh had come close to win against sub-continent giants India and Pakistan but on both occasions, they just couldn't show the killer performance that was needed to seal the deal.

But some luck in two matches here and there could well have given them the chance. Against India, they needed 85 runs off 54 balls with 10 wickets at hand after a rain break—it's a target that could be achieved by most of the teams on any day but panicking and lack of experience got the better of them as they lost the match by 5 runs, according to captain Shakib Al Hasan.

 Even though India's star player Virat Kohli's fake throw before the rain break was brought to the light by Bangladesh vice-captain Nurul Hasan Sohan, that, according to him, should give Bangladesh the five penalty runs, didn't get much attention.

Against Pakistan, Bangladesh were on the course of a good total on a slow pitch but a controversial dismissal of Shakib Al Hasan ruined the momentum and Bangladesh eventually lost the game by five wickets.

South Africa was the only team against whom, Bangladesh literally couldn't make any resistance, losing the game by 104-run, which turned out to be their biggest margin defeat in this format.But the two victories against Netherlands and Zimbabwe also came up with a lot of hardship. Bangladesh easily could lose both of the matches but again luck saved them eventually.

This luck was not with them against India and Pakistan, keeping them win-less against any top teams since the 2021 T20 World Cup.