Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) is still in dark about Bangladesh’s most successful captain Mashrafe Mortaza’s retirement, as he has kept mum about his retirement plans since the reports suggested about him bringing down the curtains on his successful career in Sri Lanka last year.
The ODI skipper was expected to retire after the ICC World Cup 2019 in England but it didn’t happen and then it sensed that he would feature for one last time when Bangladesh toured Sri Lanka for an ODI series last year but the last-minute injury didn’t let that happen.
After that, the BCB had reportedly organised an ODI series against Zimbabwe when they were in Bangladesh for a T20I tri-series involving Afghanistan last September, but the board failed to organise this series, which was intended as Mortaza's farewell assignment.
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Now, the BCB is scheduled to host Zimbabwe in a bilateral series next month including three ODIs and two T20Is along with a single Test match and the talks about Mortaza’s retirement has once again started making rounds but Mashrafe is still not revealing his retirement plan.
On Saturday, January 11, the BCB cricket operation chairman Akram Khan revealed that the board are yet to finalize the national contracts and Mortaza’s national contract renewal totally depends on him while saying they are not aware about Mashrafe’s retirement plan.
Khan told Cricbuzz, “Whether Mortaza's national contract will be renewed or not largely depends on him as we are not sure what he is thinking about his international career.”
The board official further added, “We could have taken a decision only if we knew his plans but as we are not aware of it we cannot say anything specific about it. We have a board meeting on January 12 and there we will take a decision about the national contracted players for this year.”
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Meanwhile, Mortaza has denied any plans of retiring from the game at the moment after returning to action in the ongoing Bangladesh Premier League following a lengthy injury layoff.
He said, “You can say that everybody is making me retire from the cricket. I don't carry any complain for anyone. And I have not decided anything about retirement. If the board says something than I will think about it but I am enjoying the game. I haven't taken any decision on whether I will retire from the field but if the Cricket Board has that sort of plan than definitely I will rethink about it.”
Mortaza explained, “I had the opportunity to get back to the team in Sri Lanka since Shakib was rested. I couldn't play due to injury after which Bangladesh didn't play any ODI. So I didn't get any opportunity to talk to the selectors about what they are thinking about me. But as player I am still enjoying the cricket and if the selectors give me the chance I will definitely play cricket. At the end, cricket is everything to me. So I will play cricket, be it in the national team or any other side. I am now playing BPL. There is Dhaka Premier League also, I will play there, and I will enjoy it.”
The veteran pacer also insisted that he is open for national opportunity if the Bangladesh selectors offer him, adding about his poor World Cup campaign: “To be honest, after taking one wicket from eight games, my gut feeling is that I won't be able to make it to the team. It's selection matter. If the selectors think that they will give me another opportunity, I will try my best.”
The skipper continued, “But I know if anybody, apart from me, got one wicket in eight games, he would have been dropped from the team straightway. But as player I am still enjoying the cricket and if the selectors give me the chance I will definitely play cricket. At the end, cricket is everything to me. So I will play cricket, be it in the national team or any other side. I don't know whether I will be given the captaincy [ODI] role again because that's up to the board.”
The bowler doesn’t also think the BCB would give him a farewell match, saying “I don't think that anyone needs to give me a so much priority [to give me a farewell] as I don't think it is necessary.”
Mortaza signed off by saying, “I don't think it is necessary to give me a befitting farewell. I don't want anybody to come with flower bouquet during my last game.”
(with Cricbuzz Inputs)
