Rajshahi Kings failed to replicate their heroics from last year as they finished BPL 2017 at sixth position in the points table, including just four wins in 12 matches.
Rajshahi formed a good team during the players’ auction as they picked up pacer Mustafizur Rahman as their first choice cricketer. The Kings had announced wicketkeeper-batsman Mushfiqur Rahim as their icon player. Prior to BPL 5, Mushfiq was the highest run-scorer in the history of the money-spinning tournament.Rajshahi retained West Indian World T20I winning captain Darren Sammy as their skipper. The Kings also retained the core group of players from last year’s team which contested the grand finale against Dhaka Dynamites in BPL 4. But inconsistent performances in the middle stage of the tournament paved the way for only four wins in 12 outings.
Rajshahi faced a major blow before the cash-rich competition as their star paceman Mustafizur was ruled out initially due to injury. Mustafizur suffered the injury during Bangladesh’s tour of South Africa in October this year and missed the ODI and T20I series’ against the Proteas. Rajshahi had to play their first seven matches without Mustafizur during the Sylhet and Dhaka phase of the tournament, and they managed only two wins during that stage.However, Mustafizur failed to live upto expectation when he did get fit as he picked up only four wickets in his five outings for the Kings. It was really difficult for Mustafizur to perform at his very best just after returning from an injury layoff and Rajshahi surely missed the service of their best bowler at the beginning stage of the tournament.
Rajshahi also missed the bowling effort of Sammy as he was injured. Fielding was very poor overall for Rajshahi throughout the tournament as they missed a lot of catches on the outfield. In a T20 match, there is less chance of coming back to the game after sloppy fielding and the Kings paid the price in many games due to dropped catches and poor ground fielding.Impressive performersZakir Hasan (Local)The young wicketkeeper-batsman was in good touch with the bat. He scored 169 runs in eight innings with a highest score of 51. He also kept wickets in the last few matches when Mushfiq was injured and was unable to stand behind the stumps.Mohammad Sami (Overseas)Veteran Pakistani pacer Sami bowled economically for the Kings right throughout the tournament. Sami took 11 wickets overall in nine innings at an economy rate of 6.91. His best performance came against Comilla Victorians when he picked up four wickets conceding just nine runs from his quota of four overs.Unimpressive performersMushfiqur Rahim (Local)A lot depended on Mushfiq as he was the icon player for Rajshahi this year. Rajshahi’s batting was chiefly based on this diminutive batsman as Mushfiq usually scores a lot of runs in BPL. But this year’s campaign was mediocre considering his high standard as he scored only one fifty in 11 innings, scoring 185 runs at a below-par average of 18.5.Kesrick Willimas (Overseas)The West Indies fast bowler had a good tournament last year as he helped his team reach the grand finale with some good performances. But the right-arm pacer played only six matches in this year’s BPL, taking as many wickets. More importantly, his economy rate was high (9.72), at a crucial time when Mustafizur was absent for the Kings.
Monday, July 20, 2026
