Shakib back to lead Bangladesh in first T20I

Shakib Al Hasan, who missed the two-Test series against Sri Lanka, which Bangladesh lost 1-0, has returned as captain to the Twenty20 International set-up for the first fixture of a two-match series against the same opponents, starting on 15 February in Dhaka.

The 15-man squad for the game includes four uncapped players: Abu Jahed Rahi, Ariful Haque, Zakir Hasan and Afif Hossain.

Jahed, a right-arm fast-medium bowler, has 34 wickets from 30 T20 matches, while Haque, a middle-order batsman, has scored 584 runs from 44 games at a strike rate of 122.68, and Hasan is a wicketkeeper-batsman with 18 T20 appearances under his best.

Hossain, the fourth new face, is an all-rounder who turned out for Bangladesh in the recent ICC Under-19 Cricket World Cup in New Zealand. A left-handed batsman, Hossain scored four half-centuries at the World Cup, where Bangladesh lost to India in the quarter-final, as he finished as his team’s top scorer with 276 runs from six matches. He also picked up eight wickets, including a haul of 5/43 against Canada in a group game.

The rest of the names in the squad are those of the familiar faces: Tamim Iqbal, Soumya Sarkar, Mushfiqur Rahim, Sabbir Rahman and Mahmudullah the batsmen, and Mustafizur Rahman, Rubel Hossain, Mehidy Hasan, Mohammad Saifuddin and Abu Hider Rony, who is back in the squad after last turning out for Bangladesh at the ICC World T20 2016, the bowlers.

The teams have a two-day gap after the first match before playing the second and final game in Sylhet on 18 February.

Squad: Shakib Al Hasan (capt), Tamim Iqbal, Soumya Sarkar, Sabbir Rahman, Mushfiqur Rahim (wk), Mahmudullah, Mustafizur Rahman, Rubel Hossain, Mohammad Saifuddin, Abu Haider Rony, Abu Jahed Rahi, Ariful Haque, Mehidy Hasan, Zakir Hasan, Afif Hossain.