Bangladesh captain Mominul Haque has denied he is going through any kind of bad patch and is confident that he will perform well in the first Test at Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium where he scored tons of runs in his Test career.
Mominul has a staggering record at ZACS as he scored seven Test centuries out of his 10 at this venue.
He is averaging 66.83 at this port city venue, totaling 1,203 runs from 21 innings.
The left-hander also scored heavily against Sri Lanka in his career as he made four hundreds and three fifties against the Lankans in nine Test matches.
A good solid innings from the Tigers skipper will be helpful for Bangladesh in the first match as Chittagong wicket usually favors batters' run-scoring.
Mominul has garnered 3,514 runs from 51 Tests and still holds the highest average (39.48) for Bangladesh batsmen in Test cricket but in the early years of his career he was averaging more than 60.
He is having a poor run of form as he scored just one fifty-plus innings in his last 12 innings and has scored 165 runs only in those 12 innings with a below par average of 15.
Mominul scored six and nought in the first Test and one and seven in the second Test against Pakistan in the home series last year, 88 and 13 in the first Test and nought and 37 in the second Test against New Zealand in away series this year and nought and two in the first Test and six and five in the second Test against South Africa in away series last month.
Although those three series were played in completely different conditions in the last six-seven months, an average of just 15 from the captain and one of the senior and finest Test batsmen of the country certainly proves he is out of touch in the last few outings.
Considering his recent run of form, when he was asked in the press conference whether he is going through a bad run of form, the skipper made a confident statement.
“I don’t believe I am in a bad patch. When you think you are going through bad form, it may hamper your focus. If I start to believe that I am not in good form then I may not get over it and it will become worse. I am confident in myself and the team. I believe the way we prepared ourselves, everyone will perform well in the series,” said Mominul.
The skipper also defended himself when it comes to going for the Decision Review System as often it was seen that Bangladesh lost review in crucial moment of the game or even did not apply for the review when it was close call.
“I think the bowler and keeper has the best view while we appeal for a DRS. As a captain I often field at mid-of or mid-on. So if the wicket-keeper and bowler give good feedback then collectively it turns out as a good decision. Yes, often I made mistakes with DRS calls as a captain but all the skippers around the world face such situations. Some may go your way, and some may not. I have made some good decisions in DRS as well in my career. So as for the criticism regarding this, I think I need some sort of support here from all corners (from the media and fans)”, the Bangladesh captain concluded.
