Litton to miss Asia Cup due to viral fever

 
Bangladesh opening batsman Litton Kumer Das, who could not travel to Sri Lanka with the Asia Cup squad due to viral fever, has been ruled out of the tournament as he has not recovered from the illness, a BCB press release confirmed the matter to media.

The National Selection Panel of BCB has named 30-year-old fellow right-hander AnamulHaqueBijoy as Litton's replacement. AnamulHaque has played 44 ODIs and has scored 1254 runs which include three hundreds. His last ODI appearance for Bangladesh was in December last year against India. He is due to arrive in Sri Lanka to join the Bangladesh team later today.

Chairman of the National Selection Panel MinhajulAbedin said: "He (Anamul) has been in the runs in domestic cricket and we have continued to monitor him in the Bangladesh Tigers programme. He was always in our consideration.

"Due to Litton's unavailability, we needed a top-order batter who could keep wicket and Anamul got the nod."
Liton was the most senior opener in absence of former captain Tamim Iqbal, who made himself sidelined from the tournament in a bid to have perfect recovery from the back pain.

Liton was the second cricketer to be ruled out after pacer Ebadot Hossain despite being in the Asia Cup squad. Pacer TanzimHasanSakib had already replaced Ebadot.

At this moment, Bangladesh have two genuine openers in the team-Naim Sheikh with experience of just four ODIs and TanzidHasanTamim, who is yet to make his International debut.

There are two other batters-Najmul Hossain Shanto and MehidyHasanMiraz who had the experience of opening the innings. But Shanto had already established him at No.3 position while Miraz's experience is badly needed lower down the batting order.

Shakib Al Hasan who considers himself more comfortable at No. 3 position was batting now at No.4 due to Shanto's resurgence.
Now the question came to the fore, whether Bangladesh would take risk, playing two inexperienced openers in the crucial first game, which they want to win to make a winning start to the tournament.

With many questions hovering around, Shakib refused to reveal anything.
"We have definitely plans up in the sleeve but I can't reveal it here," Shakib told the reporters on Wedndesday at Pallekele Cricket Stadium in Kandy, the venue of their first match against Sri Lanka.

"All what I can say that it's an opportunity for the players who are considered as our back up. Those who are new, it's an opportunity for them also," he said.

But Shakib spoke on AnamulHaqueBijoy whose inclusion as the replacement of Liton raised an eyebrow as he was not in the backup plan in Bangladesh squad. Rather there are some other players who were considered heavily to replace Liton.

"Anamul has been brought up mainly considering his wicket-keeping ability and he also bats in the top of the batting order. Liton is the top order batter and is a wicket-keeper, so Bijoy is like-to-like swap," Shakib said.

Explaining the matter further, he said: "At the same time, Liton's injury leaves Mushfiqur Rahim as the only keeper-batter in our team. If Mushfiqur receives injury and or if he needs to be substituted as concussion sub unfortunately, we need a keeper batter. So in this sense, Bijoy was considered ahead of the others

SQUAD

Shakib Al Hasan (Captain), Najmul Hossain Shanto, TawhidHridoy, Mushfiqur Rahim, Afif Hossain Dhrubo, MehidyHasanMiraz, Taskin Ahmed, Hasan Mahmud, Mustafizur Rahman, Shoriful Islam, Nasum Ahmed, ShakMahediHasan, Naim Sheikh, Shamim Hossain, TanzidHasanTamim, TanzimHasanSakib, AnamulHaqueBijoy