DHAKA, Oct 27, 2019 (BSS)-The Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) has decided
to launch a new domestic tournament for the Under-18 women’s cricketers as
they are gearing up for the first ever Under1-9 Women’s T20 World Cup in
2021.
The tournament set to begin on November 7 in Mymensingh with eight
divisional teams taking part in the Twenty20 competition.
The selected players from the tournament will be brought in a training
camp where they will prepare themselves for the first ever Under-19 women’s
Twenty20 World Cup in 2021.
Bangladesh are set to host the first ever Under-19 women’s Twenty20
World Cup in 2021 and they will participate in the 10-team tournament as the
host country.
However Bangladesh have no age-level teams apart from their national
team, A team and the emerging team and in order to participate in the
tournament they needed to form a team between September 2020, according to
International Cricket Council guideline.
The BCB on Sunday held a discussion with divisional secretaries and
coaches in order to form Bangladesh Under-19 women’s team in order to
participate in the ICC Under-19 women’s cricket World Cup.
Shafiul Alam Chowdhury Nadel, director of BCB and chairman of women’s
wing, Nizamuddin Chowdhury, CEO of BCB, Najmul Islam, member secretary,
women’s wing and Towhid Mahmood, in-charge (operations) of women’s wing were
also present on the occasion.
Shafiul was optimistic about forming an under-19 team within next four
to five months even though he ponders it as a challenge.
“We are planning to go through a process with the age-level teams from
where will be able to select the players,” the Women’s team director Nadel
said here today.
“The event may be hosted in Dhaka, Sylhet, and Chattorgram, in these
three venues. Because we are the hosting nation, we are having some long-term
plans.” Nadel said.
“We are going to start with school level cricket in all divisions,”
Nadel added.
“We will be targeting eight schools. If the schools give us 15 players,
we will be hosting a short term camp, or our divisional coaches can work with
them.”
Despite having a very short period of time to prepare age-level teams
ahead of the tournament, Nadel said the school level cricket will also help
them to prepare their age-level teams for pipeline players.
“If we take school level becomes our primary stage, then under-17,
under-18 and under-19 teams will be ready,” he said.
“You cannot arrange school cricket in November and December like other
tournaments. Because students usually have exams during then. We will take to
January and February,” he believes.
According to the plans, the divisional coaches and secretaries have
already been called for discussions as the board director said.
“We brought the divisional Secretaries and coaches because so we will
have good opportunities in this tournament. So we need the assistance from
divisional coaches and secretaries.”