50 years of Victory, but how far has cricket come?

Cricket has been the premier sport in Bangladesh for a while now although football was more popular in the seventies and eighties. It all started six years after Bangladesh emerged as an independent nation when the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC) team visited Bangladesh in 1977. 

2021 marks 50 years of Bangladesh's independence. The country has grown a lot in various sectors including sports, cricket in particular. There have been stories of failures, stories of heartbreaks. But Bangladesh cricket has enjoyed its fair share of success as well. But if one is asked to evaluate Bangladesh's journey in international cricket, the failures will probably overshadow the successes. 

As mentioned earlier, some consider the match between Bangladesh and the touring MCC side in 1977 to be the first international affair involving the former. But as per the records, Bangladesh made their first appearance in international cricket in the 1986 Asia Cup when they faced Pakistan at the Tyronne Fernando Stadium in Moratuwa, Sri Lanka under the captaincy of Gazi Ashraf Hossain. Bangladesh lost the match by seven wickets. 

11 years later, after multiple failed attempts, Bangladesh finally won the title of the 1997 ICC Trophy and qualified to play in the 1999 ICC Cricket World Cup. That was the first of many feathers in the cap for Bangladesh in cricket.

Bangladesh started the 21st century on a high as they secured the Test status and became an ICC full member in 2000. On 26 November, Bangladesh became the 10th Test-playing nation. 

Bangladesh could've tasted their first win in red-ball cricket in 2003 had some of the on-field decisions gone Bangladesh's way. Two years later in Chattogram, they beat Zimbabwe under Habibul Bashar's captaincy and ended a 34-Test drought. 

After a fairly good World Cup campaign in 1999, Bangladesh had to return home empty-handed from the 2003 World Cup. Four years later, they had a fantastic World Cup, beating the likes of India and South Africa. 

Bangladesh won the gold medal in the cricket discipline of the 2010 Guangzhou Asian Games, beating Afghanistan by five wickets in the final. In 2011, Bangladesh co-hosted the ICC Cricket World Cup with India and Sri Lanka. Bangladesh won three matches in that tournament but couldn't progress to the quarterfinals.

Bangladesh beat two powerhouses - India and Sri Lanka - in the 2012 Asia Cup and narrowly lost to Pakistan (by two runs) in the final. Bangladesh became the solo host of the 2014 ICC World T20 but their performance in the tournament was abysmal. 

Bangladesh had their best-ever World Cup campaign in 2015 under Mashrafe Mortaza, making the quarterfinals of the tournament. After the World Cup, they became unstoppable. Mortaza's men won the ODI series against the likes of Pakistan, India and South Africa and qualified to participate in the 2017 ICC Champions Trophy.

The Tigers were on fire in the 2017 ICC Champions Trophy, making it to the semifinals of a major ICC event for the first time in their history. But Bangladesh fell short again in the 2018 Asia Cup final. This time they lost to India in a last-ball finish.

But the women's team won the Asia Cup before the men as Salma Khatun's team beat India in the final of the 2018 Women's Asia Cup.

Bangladesh went into the 2019 ICC Cricket World Cup with a lot of expectations but couldn't win more than two matches in the tournament.

In February 2020, Bangladesh won the title of the Under-19 Cricket World Cup, beating India in the final. It was undoubtedly Bangladesh's biggest achievement in any sport. A few days ago, Bangladesh women's team qualified to take part in the 2022 Women's Cricket World Cup. 

Despite all those achievements, Syed Ashraful Haque - one of the architects of Bangladesh cricket - is disappointed with the state at which Bangladesh cricket is right now.

"First of all, I never thought I would watch Bangladesh play Test cricket in my lifetime. That Bangladesh received the Test status in the year 2000 was a miracle. I consider myself lucky for the fact that I have watched Bangladesh play Test cricket," he said.

"But our cricket did not progress as much as it should have. It disappoints me. Especially in Test cricket, we are lagging behind day by day. The situation is more or less the same in T20s. We were ranked fifth in ICC T20I rankings a few days ago but our performances do not speak for themselves," added the former cricketer.

Haque, the former joint secretary of the Asian Cricket Council (ACC), said that securing Test status is Bangladesh's biggest achievement in Tests. 

"Of course, securing Test status is our biggest achievement. But we could not do what we should have done to live up to the Test status. I am very disappointed. Our cricket is not progressing at all," he said.

About cricket in Bangladesh post-1971, Syed Ashraful Haque said, "Our cricket started to take baby steps when the MCC team toured Bangladesh in 1977. From then to 1999, our performance graph fluctuated as we did not have much international exposure barring the Asia Cups. Yes, we won the ICC Trophy in 1999, played the World Cup the same year but the international reckoning came in 2000 when we got Test status."

The famous cricket organiser signed off saying, "I feel proud whenever Bangladesh wins a match. But all said and done, our progress has not been up to the mark. Money was never a problem. Then why is our cricket in such a sorry state? I don't have the answer."

Raqibul Hasan, former captain and member of the Bangladesh cricket team, is famous for walking out to open the innings with a bat that had a 'Joy Bangla' sticker in it in 1971 as an 18-year-old. He also expressed his disappointment as Bangladesh could not fulfil his dream as a Test-playing nation.

"When we used to play cricket, there were a lot of quality players. We loved the game. We were students of good institutions. We knew there was a legacy of cricket here. Whenever a team toured Pakistan, at least one match used to be held in Dhaka. That's because of the popularity of the game here."

"There were a lot of problems post-independence. Rumours were there that such an expensive sport could not be played in a socialistic structure and we protested. There was no cricket for two years. But we never stopped dreaming. We knew that cricket was never a game of power, rather a game of brains and skill. That's why we can now compete on the biggest stage. I used to say that cricket would be Bangladesh's game," added Raqibul.

But his dreams are yet to be fulfilled. In fact, there is a long way to go. "There should've been more progress," said the former cricketer. "We are improving. But I have to say that our cricket is not where it should've been by now. The consistency is not there."

"I would be happier if Bangladesh were the sixth team in the Test and ODI rankings. At this moment, I must say that T20 has destroyed our cricket. A lot of cricketers are retiring from international cricket just to make money from franchise leagues. I hope it won't affect Bangladesh cricket. We have to make a roadmap. We have to make a plan for the next five years, ten years and set targets," Raqibul concluded.