Bangladesh Test captain Mominul Haque said they are confident of winning the two-match series in Sri Lanka even without the service of Shakib Al Hasan and Mustafizur Rahman who are busy playing in the Indian Premier League (IPL) for Kolkata Knight Riders and Rajasthan Royals respectively. 

A 21-member preliminary Test squad of Bangladesh is all set to fly to Sri Lanka on Monday for a two-match Test series against the hosts. The series will begin on April 21 at Pallekele International Cricket Stadium, Kandy. Both the matches will take place at the same venue. 

Bangladesh’s last tour was to New Zealand where the Tigers failed to come victorious in any of six limited-over matches against the hosts. Now they are in dire need to bounce back. 

Shakib and Mustafizur would have been Bangladesh’s biggest weapons in the Sri Lanka tour. But the Tigers are set to miss their service as both of them were allowed to skip this tour for IPL. Despite their absence, Mominul believes that Bangladesh has the ability to outplay Sri Lanka. 

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“I don’t think we cannot win without Shakib and Mustafizur,” Mominul told the reporters on Sunday at Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium after a practice session. “We have more players in our team. They don’t have 10-12 hands (to play better than others). We also don’t have many hands. I don’t think their absence will make any impact. We couldn’t come up as a team in recent time and that’s why we have been failing to bring the result to tour favour. This is as simple as it.”

Mominul led the Tigers in six Tests so far, and the Tigers lost in all occasions except one against Zimbabwe. The other five matches were part of the World Test Championship. The forthcoming Sri Lanka series is also a part of the same event. 

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“We cannot tell what will happen in future,” he added. “What we can do is to give our full effort to play well. To win a Test match, we have to play well in every session of the game. We’ll get the result to our side if we play better, otherwise, we’ll lose.”

The Sri Lanka tour will be Bangladesh’s first foreign tour for Tests during the Covid-19 pandemic. Mominul said the preparation ahead of this series would have been better.

“You cannot prepare much during a pandemic,” Mominul said. “But we fulfilled the required preparation. It’s tough for the players who only play white-ball cricket. The other players took part in two four-day matches (in National Cricket League).

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Bangladesh included three uncapped pace-bowlers for this series— Shoriful Islam, Shohidul Islam and Mukidul Islam Mugdho. Along with them, Yasir Ali Rabbi also found a place in the preliminary squad. 

According to the Bangladesh captain, the young players deserve backing from the media and the senior players of the team. He said the young players are ready to prove their mettle at the bigger stage of the game.

After this series, the Sri Lanka national team is scheduled to tour Bangladesh for a three-match ODI series in mid-May. BCB has recently said that they are preparing for the series despite the recent surge of Covid-19 cases in the country.