Much like the way Pakistan’s cricket fans now have an ‘unnofficial’ side to follow which plays more often than the ‘official’ side (two if you count both the Lahore Badshahs and the ICL Pakistan XI), there are now two Bangladesh teams to follow.
One, that backed by the official governing body, will play in the Second Test against South Africa tomorrow, hoping to salvage some pride. The prospect of a win in that contest seems exceedingly unlikely, given (as Will Luke puts it) the fact that “their form guide, a string of ‘Ls’, reads like a Welsh railway station“.
Meanwhile, the unofficial, ICL side had some success today, beating their Indian equivalents with 3 balls to spare mainly thanks to the efforts of Shahriar Nafees. If the ‘real’ Bangladesh keep losing, then more and more casual fans may be drawn to the glamour and relative success of the ‘fake’ ICL side. That would, in my view, be a shame, but I can’t blame those fans if they feel they’d rather watch a half-decent Twenty20 side than see the Test side get hammered repeatedly.
