Bangladesh received a major blow ahead of the three-match T20I series against Afghanistan as their pace bowler Mustafizur Rahman was ruled out of the series with a toe injury, according to a Cricbuzz report.
The report said that a Bangladesh Cricket Board official confirmed Mustafizur’s unavailability and revealed that the management was yet to decide on a replacement.
The Bangladesh team will travel to India on Tuesday to play the series, scheduled at the Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium in Hyderabad on June 3, 5 and 7.
According to BCB physician Debashish Chowdhury, Mustafizur suffered the injury during the recent Indian Premier League (IPL) and would require two to three weeks to return to full fitness.
This comes after Bangladesh's senior players said they believe that they need to ensure they don’t let leading Afghan leg-spinner Rashid Khan get into their heads ahead of the Afghanistan series.
Rashid is expected to be one of the biggest threats for Bangladesh and considering his recent performances in the Indian Premier League (IPL), it hardly was surprising.
The top-ranked bowler in the ICC Twenty20 ranking, the leg-spinner played a vital role in his franchise Sunrisers Hyderabad in the IPL storming into the final where they lost to Chennai Super Kings in Mumbai.
From the opening day of the preparation camp from May 13 to May 26, Bangladesh spent most of their time exchanging views on the spin threat of their opposition that is expected to be led by Rashid, Cricbuzz reported.
"For any batsman, the most difficult part is his quick arm action and there is a vast improvement in his accuracy. Perhaps six months back he was not that accurate,'' Tamim Iqbal, Bangladesh’s cricketer said ahead of the series, trying to point out the reason behind Rashid's recent success.
"He is quite successful and managed to trouble all the leading batsmen of the world. But that does not mean he is unplayable. If we can express ourselves, there is no reason why we won't be able to negotiate him well,'' he said.
Tamim said that he is not concentrating on Rashid alone as their opponent as they have a few other good players in their team.