Pacers thrive in their natural habitat

The way Ebadot Hossain welcomed the experienced Ross Taylor to the crease, with a well-directed bouncer that the right-hander somehow managed to survive, served as a perfect example of true fast bowling at Mount Maunganui yesterday.

Once again, Bangladesh's pacers gathered steam and gained confidence on a typically seam-friendly surface in New Zealand, showing the signs of a unit complementing each other.

This time it was Ebadot who brought Bangladesh back into the game in the last hour of the fourth day, picking up three wickets in the span of nine deliveries to gun down the hosts from a comfortable 136 for two to 136 for five in their second innings.

Operating with a cool head and consistency in going through the process correctly, Ebadot was finally rewarded by the all-important breakthrough in the 54th over. Ebadot's short of a length delivery shaped into Will Young, who misread the length and went for a pull, allowing the ball to strike timber.

Ebadot should also surely get full marks for game awareness just a ball later, when he fired in a full and straight delivery to new batsman Henry Nicholls. He struggled to adjust and the ball went on to demolish his stumps.

In his following over, the 27-year-old again kept things simple and used the conditions to great effect to trap Tom Blundell leg before with another delivery.

It was a refreshing sight to see someone like Ebadot step up, but it will be important for the team management to make sure such performances do not remain rare one-off shows. Instead, the think-tank needs to take the next step towards consistency.

This also raises questions about the need to give seamers a platform in the domestic circuit in the form of swing and bounce in the surface that can encourage fast bowlers.

"They like bowling in conditions like these because they don't get conditions back at home that encourage them to enjoy bowling," team director Khaled Mahmud said.

The likes of Taskin Ahmed, Shoriful Islam, Ebadot and Abu Jayed have shown potential, but because fast-bowling is a demanding task, both mentally and physically, it is also important to groom a bigger lot by giving exposure to seamers at home.

"It is important to have ideal conditions and pitches where seamers can enjoy the art of fast bowling in domestic cricket. A fast bowler must set the placement of fielders himself and if you don't know where to bowl on different surfaces, it becomes very difficult to improve as a bowler," prominent coach Sarwar Imran told The Daily Star who has groomed Ebadot during his early days of a career in the high-performance unit.

"We still lag behind when it comes to providing suitable conditions to pacers and if seamers are not encouraged, you cannot expect them to deliver every time they travel abroad even in favorable conditions."

India can be a perfect example, given how they developed a bunch of fast bowlers by encouraging them in the domestic circuit and how having a good fast-bowling group is equally as necessary as having a good batting unit for a Test team, especially away from home.

For Bangladesh, the ongoing Test match can set a trend when it comes to promoting fast bowlers, not only for this series but also to improve as a team in world cricket in the coming days.