Bangladesh captain fumes over Super Four scheduling howler

dubai — A scheduling howler for the Unimoni Asia Cup Super Four stage has left a bitter taste in the mouth for Bangladesh and Pakistan.

The first grouse for these teams was that the Board of Control for Cricket India (BCCI) being hosts, Team India was accorded the privilege of playing all their matches in Dubai.

According to the original draw, the Winners of A were to play runners up of Group B in Dubai and vice versa. However, irrespective of their position in Group A India, if they qualified, were scheduled to play in Dubai.

India finished with two wins and topped Group A.

According to the original draw, India should have played the runners up of Group B and that was to be decided after Thursday’s match between Bangladesh v Afghanistan in Abu Dhabi.

On Wednesday, however, the Asian Cricket Council (ACC) released the Super Four schedule in which Bangladesh is slated to play India on Friday in first Super Four match. The positions in Group B thus became meaningless.

Bangladesh captain Mashrafe Mortaza made no bones about his displeasure on being made second-placed team Group B. They ended up playing last league match in Abu Dhabi on Thursday and drawn to play India in Dubai on Friday.

“It is very disappointing,” Mashrafe told media during a pre-match briefing in Abu Dhabi on Wednesday.

“Basically we have been made the second team in Group B even before we played the last game,” said the frustrated Bangladesh captain.

Mashrafe was also worried about the travel time the team will have to take to go to Abu Dhabi and return as the teams are based in Dubai. They would have reached back to their hotel in Dubai past midnight and were scheduled to play India in first Super Four match in less than 12 hours of travelling back from Abu Dhabi.

It was worse for Afghanistan as they had to travel back and forth on two successive days.

Pakistan captain Sarfraz Ahmed had also expressed his displeasure at the scheduling of the tournament and preferential treatment given to India.