SPORTS

Tamim Iqbal ruled out of Pakistan series

Bangladesh received a major blow ahead of their forthcoming home series against Pakistan after opener Tamim Iqbal was ruled out due to a thumb injury that he suffered while playing franchise cricket in Kathmandu.

Tamim though skipped three-match T20 series against Pakistan, who was eying a comeback to the national fold with two-match Test series, which is the part of World Test Championship (WTC).

Even though his strike rate often raised a question about his usefulness in the limited over cricket, Tamim still remains by far the most assured component in Bangladesh’s Test squad.

The left-hand batsman started the net session last week to prepare for the Test series but went for an x-ray as he felt uncomfortable during batting against pace bowlers.

The report revealed that he had a fracture on his left thumb, which he had earlier injured during an Everest Premier League match in Kathmandu last month.

“A thumb injury ruled Tamim out of the Pakistan series,” Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) chief selector Minhajul Abedin said.

“The swelling has not healed and due to that reason he had another x-ray. It revealed he is having a fracture that was not found out previously,” he added.

Tamim completed rehabilitation work on the thumb in the last four weeks, even starting to bat against fast bowling recently at the Shere Bangla National Stadium. He was planning to appear for Chattogram Division in the National Cricket League in the fifth round that began today.

But the continued swelling and pain prompted a second look, which showed that a fracture remained.

“The fracture had almost healed but my thumb remained swollen,” Tamim said. “So we wanted to have another X-ray, which revealed that there was a fracture. Probably there were two, but it didn’t come out in the first scan. The finger has gone back into the split. I can’t move it. The whole process has to start again.”

Bangladesh will take on Pakistan for the first of the three T20Is on November 19 at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium in Mirpur. The second and third T20Is will be on November 20 and 22 respectively at the same venue. All the T20Is will be starting from 2:00pm as per Bangladesh Standard Time (BST).

The teams will then travel to Chattogram to play the first Test from November 26 at the Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium. They will then return to Dhaka for the final fixture of the tour, the second Test, which will be played from December 4 in Mirpur.

 

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