‘It's difficult to prepare hard-hitters unless the wickets improve'

Chattogram Challengers all-rounder Ziaur Rahman put on a show displaying his hard-hitting abilities scoring 47 off 25 balls in his side's 26-run loss against Fortune Barishal in Chattogram. 

The Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury stadium kept its reputation for producing high-scoring encounters as the opening game of the Chattogram phase of the Bangladesh Premier League 2023 saw a 200-plus score where Fortune Barishal posted 202-7 against Chattogram Challengers on Friday.

In reply, Chattogram fought well, courtesy of Ziaur blistering knock which saw him hit four sixes and three boundaries but his effort went in vain as they ended up on 176-4 losing by 26 runs.

Ziaur believes that to prepare hard-hitters for the future, the pitches have to improve at home and that the two aspects must go hand-in-hand.

"When it comes to power-hitting, there were scores of 180-190 in Mirpur where the Bangladesh players like Towhid Hridoy and Zakir Hasan did well. But I feel the main problem here for the power-hitting is the pitch. If the wicket is not good, you won't be able to work on power-hitting because only if the ball comes onto the bat nicely, you will be able to hit those shots," Ziaur told the reporters after the match on Friday.

Ziaur built his reputation of being a hard-hitter quite early in his career making a name for himself for that specific role featuring in 14 T20Is for Bangladesh but failed to become a mainstay in the team after he struggled to keep up his promise of being a batter who could hit big and play with significant strike-rates.

Bangladesh have been in a long search for hard-hitters who are more suited to the demands of the shortest format of the game and the hunt continues.

The 36-year-old from Khulna, who played his last T20I back in March 2014,  acknowledged that the Mirpur pitch this time around was better compared to the previous editions and it is important for batters to habituate to batting on better surfaces which could help develop the power-hitting aspect of their batting.
 
"I think the habit is important and once the wicket is better, power hitting will come automatically. But if the surface is not good enough, you won't be able to hit no matter how good your technique is as you need the ball to come onto the bat," he added.