Simmons said Bangladesh had given the game away to India with their poor starts with both bat and ball. “We lost in batting in overs one to ten, and the same in bowling. We have to make sure we win in those areas,” Simmons said ahead of the New Zealand game. “We need to assess and put together our batting better in the first ten overs. The middle and lower order have done really well so it is up to our top-order batsmen to put things together in the first ten or 15 overs, especially.”
Bangladesh had slipped to 35 for 5 in the ninth over in that game in Dubai. Soumya Sarkar fell in Mohammad Shami’s first over before captain Najmul Hossain Shanto gave Virat Kohli a catch at cover in the second. Tanzid Hasan and Mehidy Hasan Miraz didn’t last too long either, while Mushfiqur Rahim fell for a golden duck.
“This is a big-scoring ground. We saw the score in Lahore yesterday. We are looking at 300-plus here,” Simmons said. “In the last five matches, we made 300 a couple of times. So we have the ability to do it. We didn’t start well in the last game, but still we got to 200 [231]. If we start well, we will get there [300].”
Bangladesh are facing a familiar opposition in New Zealand – they have faced them most frequently in bilateral cricket than anyone else since 2015. “All the games in this tournament are pressure games. These are the top-eight teams in the world, and you expect every game to be hard,” Simmons said. “They [New Zealand] are definitely playing well but tomorrow is a new day. We will try to make sure that they don’t play as well as they have been playing.”
“I think the guys took a lot of confidence in that going into that first game against Pakistan, but then also here into Bangladesh. Again, it’s probably a reset, it’s a different surface, a different team. But I think the way the guys have been planning and netting and stuff has all been good stuff.”
