Sporting pitches in BCL encouraging seamers

Pacer Khaled Ahmed's ten-wicket haul guided East Zone to their maiden Bangladesh Cricket League (BCL) title with a comprehensive innings and 112-run win over North Zone at Sylhet International Cricket Stadium yesterday. The cricketer from Sylhet picked up seven wickets in the second innings to bundle North out for 132 runs. Khaled was also adjudged the player of the tournament as he ended the tournament as the leading wicket-taker with 18 scalps from two matches. With the urge to produce pace-conducive surfaces in order to enhance the quality of cricket in the domestic circuit, the 31-year-old's dominating performance came as a breeze of fresh air. In conversation with Mazhar Uddin of The Daily Star, the right-arm quick talked about the importance of playing on sporting pitches at home and his own progress among a few other topics. The excerpts of the interview are given below:

The Daily Star (DS): How do you rate your performance in the BCL?

Khaled Ahmed (KA): I am very happy to be able to contribute to my team's success and as a player, it is satisfying when your performance helps the team. It was our maiden BCL title so this makes it even more special.

DS: You ended up as the leading wicket-taker in the BCL, picking up 18 wickets in two matches. What is your take on the pitch?

KA: It was challenging in the sense that we played on sporting pitches throughout the tournament. The pitches offered something for both the batters and the bowlers which makes it an even contest. There was something for spinners as well but it was nothing like rank turners which only suit spinners. So as a pacer, I enjoyed bowling on such surfaces.

DS: Do you believe such sporting tracks in domestic competitions can help improve the skills of players?

KA: Definitely, there has been a lot of talk about having sporting pitches in domestic competitions in the past and I must say things have improved in the last few years. When you play on sporting pitches, it helps you to develop skills both as a bowler and also as a batter. We have seen Mominul [Haque] bhai and Naeem [Islam] bhai scoring hundreds for which they had to work really hard, and as a cricketer, you always want to take that challenge. On the other hand, being a pacer, you always expect some bounce and carry from the surface, and when you get that, it encourages bowlers to work on their bowling to test the batters.

DS: Have you worked on any variation during this tournament?

KA: Well, yes. As I mentioned earlier, it was challenging for the bowlers on sporting tracks so my first aim was to bowl at right line and length consistently. If you have noticed, [Mohammed] Shami, whether he plays Test, ODIs, or T20Is, always tries to bowl at a particular area and get success. Apart from that I have also worked on my outswing and I was mostly successful with my outswingers in this tournament. As inswinging is my natural movement, the ability to swing both ways will help me in the coming days.