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Asia Cup 2022: Mosaddek Hossain backs Shakib Al Hasan’s decision to bat first

image-l7glawf5Mosaddek Hossain defends skipper Shakib Al Hasan (PC: Twitter)

Bangladesh have jeopardized their qualification chances in the Asia Cup 2022 following a seven-wicket loss against Afghanistan. Playing at the Sharjah Cricket Ground, the batters let the team down. Bangladesh now need to win their second game against Sri Lanka, by all means, to earn a qualification to the Super Four round.

Winning the toss, Shakib Al Hasan made the unorthodox choice of batting first. Batting second is considered easy in the United Arab Emirates due to dew and the behavior of the pitch. However, the Bangladesh skipper thought otherwise as he labeled the Sharjah track as a good batting wicket.  

Shakib criticized for batting first

The batters failed to live up to the trust of their captain and ended up with just 127 runs in their 20 overs. It was a complete failure of the top order as none of the top five batters scored even 15 runs. Mosaddek Hossain was the only player to show some intent with the bat as he smacked 48 runs off 31 balls.

As Afghanistan chased the total within 18.3 overs, Shakib was put under major scrutiny for his decision of batting first. Amidst the criticism, Hossain backed his captain’s call. The middle-order batter believes that it would have been more difficult to keep up with the run rate in the second innings while facing Rashid Khan.  

Hossain explains the reason behind the loss

Speaking in the press conference, Hossain said,

"If I say the same thing [regarding toss], when you bat against Rashid Khan, you don't want to be in a scenario where you need seven or eight an over. We wanted to be closer to the score we wanted but we could not completely keep to our plan.”

Meanwhile, Hossain also reflected on what went wrong with Bangladesh in Sharjah. Citing the example of Afghanistan, the 26-year-old explained that the batters should have been careful with their wickets. He admitted that losing wickets at regular intervals restricted Bangladesh from capitalizing on the death overs and the same cost them the match.

Also Read: Asia Cup 2022: Shakib Al Hasan speaks on Bangladesh's defeat