Sports Reporter :Spirited Bangladesh National Cricket team will face the touring Pakistan National Cricket team in the first One Day International (ODI) match at the Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium in Mirpur. The day/night affair starts at 2.30 pm (Bangladesh Time). Bangladesh Television will telecast the match live from the stadium.Marking the opening ODI, Captain of Bangladesh team Shakib Al Hasan and Captain of Pakistan team Azhar Ali spoke at their respective press conference held in the Media Briefing Room of SBNCS on Thursday.Shakib Al Hasan said, “We are confident. We played consistent cricket in the recently concluded World Cup Cricket. If we can perform our best, we will bring the result in favour of us. We will try hard to snatch the victory.” Hasan said, ” We are favourites in ODI series. Our side have the capability to beat Pakistan. They lost to the practice one-dayer. So, apparently they are lagging behind us. We have to exploit that opportunity and win the game.” Azhar Ali said, ” Bangladesh have improved their position in the last few months. As a team they are playing really well. Most of them are intelligent. If we compare between the two teams, we see that most of our players are young. But they are talented. We have to win with the help of those brilliant players. It is very challenging.”Ali said, “It was important for us to earn win in the practice one-dayer. We made many experiment in the practice match. I am glad with the performance of our players in the warm-up match.”Bangladesh Team (probable): Tamim Iqbal, Rony Talukdar, Soumya Sarkar, Mahmudullah Riyad, Mushfiqur Rahim (Wicketkeeper), Shakib Al Hasan (Captain), Sabbir Rahman, Nasir Hossain, Arafat Sunny, Taskin Ahmed and Rubel Hossain. Pakistan team (probable): Mohammad Hafeez, Azhar Ali (Captain), Haris Sohail, Saad Nasim, Fawad Alam, Sarfraz Ahmed (Wicketkeeper), Wahab Riaz, Junaid Khan, Saeed Ajmal, Rahat Ali and Ehsan Adil.
