It is going to get harder, says Agar after another day of toil in Mirpur

Ashton Agar, whose unbeaten 41 towards the end helped Australia cross 200 said his team has its back to the wall as the visitors struggled to handle Bangladeshi spinners in the first Test at the Sher-e-Bangla Stadium in Mirpur.

“It’s going to get harder and harder to bat on. The Bangladesh spinners were very accurate for a long time, and they got their reward. Shakib got five wickets and bowled quite nicely and Mehidy [Hasan Miraz] bowled quite nicely as well. It’s hard to hit when you hit a good length, it’s really tough to score, sometimes you have to take a risk and that’s often when they get the wicket. It is going to get a bit tougher,” Agar conceded after the end of day’s play.

Agar played 97 balls, hitting just a couple of fours and a six as his batting offered a hint to what the Aussies should be doing in the remaining series. The Aussie batsmen had began well in the recent series in India by winning the first Test but could prevent a series loss as the batsmen failed to dominate.

Agar’s tendency to keep his bat well in front of his pad to avoid lbws paid dividends. “We talk a lot about that. We say ‘don’t get beaten on the inside edge of the bat.’ When the ball spins, it generally spins a long way and it’s not too often you’re going to get bowled on the outside edge because the ball spins too far. So if you cover the inside edge, make sure you don’t get hit on the pad, that’s when you’re pretty safe. It is hard to do but you have to have good focus when you’re out there,” he added.

“[The plan was] pretty much just watch the ball and try and make good decisions. Hit mostly with the spin. They bowled quite well to their credit, the spinners were quite tough at times and you just had to wait for a bad ball.”