ICC World Cup 2019 | Mashrafe Mortaza to feature in their opening game despite hamstring injury against India

The Bangladesh cricket team’s bad day at the office against India after a huge loss to the Men in Blue was further made worse after their captain suffered an injury scare. Bowling his sixth over in a long spell in the game’s early stages, Mortaza pulled his hamstring and his involvement in the game post the incident was minimal as he was confined to the dressing room for large parts of the game, clearly struggling. 

Having 209 ODI caps to his name including 78 as captain, Mortaza’s experience has been a crucial factor behind the recent surge of The Tigers and the skipper spoke like a true leader when he said he will be able to overcome the injury and play his part in the game against South Africa. 

"A lot of times in such cases, I face trouble bowling the first one or two overs. Once I get through that, I don't face any more problems. I also wasn't facing any problems today [on Tuesday], but I pulled a hamstring during the sixth over. I could have stopped after four or five overs but Rohit and Kohli were looking to score runs quickly during that period. I felt that I needed to practice bowling in such a situation,” he said, reported the Dhaka-based bdnews24.

With a wealth of experience in the squad, Mortaza’s deputy in the format and the country’s leader in Test and T20s, Shakib Al Hasan, was seen holding the reins to the team most of the times against India and is an able enough leader to guide the team in Mortaza’s absence. However, he is facing injury concerns of his own having only recently returned to the international scene after spending around 5 months on the sidelines. 

Mortaza played his first World Cup as long back as 16 years ago and is no doubt the integral piece around which the whole squad is built. He admitted that the injury concerns are piling up, with Mustafizur Rahman and Tamim Iqbal also not taking part against India. Iqbal’s injury though is a minor one and his expected return against the Proteas on the second of June, along with Mortaza, will surely boost the team’s confidence.