Going by the recent performance of Mustafizur Rahman, Bangladesh national team selector Habibul Bashar Sumon said the pace bowler has become predictable of late, at least in the death overs, putting an adverse impact on the team and fellow bowlers.
Even though Mustafizur kept taking wickets regularly, his bowling lacked penetration, which resulted in leaking runs in abundance.
According to Bashar, Mustafizur’s stock weapon slower yorker and cutter became such predictable that batsmen now aren’t fazed by it totally.
He also seemed to be annoyed with the bowler for not trying different things to confuse the batsmen, something which he termed huge ‘concern’ for Bangladesh,
“Earlier he has the yorker to baffle the batsmen but this skill has been completely diminished,” Bashar said here on Thursday. “He still is using the slower ball to good effect and the pace has been enhanced but the Yorker is missing. He is becoming predictable for the batsmen, which is my concern. The batsmen now reads him well that what he is going to do now.”
Playing for Rangpur Rangers in the ongoing Bangabandhu Bangladesh Premier League (BBPL), Mustafizur finished with figure of 4-37-2 in the first match against Cumilla Warriors.
While in his first two overs, he conceded just 6 runs to claim those two wickets, he missed his yorker and length repeatedly in the last two overs, for which Cumilla captain Dasun Shanaka punished him in disdain to take 31 runs, including 25 runs in his last over, hitting four towering sixes, one of which is considered as the longest six in BPL history.
Shanaka finally helped Cumilla amass 51 runs in last two overs and eventually led the side’s 105-run win over Rangpur.
Mustafizur’s last over is regarded as the key to Rangpur’s big defeat in the first match as it put an adverse impact to the whole team. He missed his yorker, which is a key weapon in limited over cricket’s death overs to tie the batsmen down.
“I think he needs to rethink about his bowling. It’s high time for him to go for plan B, since for batsmen he is now easy to read,” Bashar said.
“A cricket should think how he can do well when he becomes predictable to the batsmen. If we look at the yesterday’s match, he bowled really well in the first two overs but in the last two overs, he was completely predictable. In T20 Shanaka is very good batsman but Mustafizur didn’t try anything different. He was bowling in same length and conceded six after six to Shanaka.”
