Cricket | Tamim urges team to go back to basics

Bangladesh will aim to get back to the basics and avoid panicking as they prepare for their Nidahas Trophy campaign on the back of a disappointing performance in recent past.

Bangladesh's misery began with the tour of South Africa and continued in the home series against Sri Lanka. They were unable to sustain the momentum in the tri-series and eventually lost the title to Sri Lanka. They also failed to regroup in the two-Test series, three ODIs and two T20Is against Sri Lanka.

Bangladesh will now look to regroup in the Nidahas Trophy without Shakib Al Hasan, their regular T20I skipper and most experienced cricketer in the shortest format of the game. Tamim Iqbal, however, had no hesitation in conceding it's going to be tough.

"It will be a different challenge here," he said before the start of the T20I tri-series in Sri Lanka. "We know that we are not in the best of forms as a team but this can happen. As I have said, it's normal for batsmen as well as bowlers. We go through good and bad patches.

"So, as a team, it is quite normal for that to happen. For me, the most important thing for a batsman when he is out of form is to not panic. I think in some cases we are panicking a lot and I feel we need to curb that. As a team you have to accept that, when things are not going well, we should not be panicking and instead get back to basics. We have to remember the basics which we executed to achieve results in the last few years."

Tamim believes the unexpected departure of Chandika Hathurusingha also played a part and the team wasn't sure how to cope with the situation. "We have panicked here as well. He [Hathurusingha] left and it is as if everything came to an end; [but] that's not the case," stressed the Bangladesh opener.

"It is not like everything will fall in place. After he left, we have to start again and it is better to take our time and start afresh," he concluded.

(CRICBUZZ)