Former Bangladesh Cricket Team captain and pitcher Mushfiqur Rahim took to Twitter on Sunday to announce his break from the T20 international cricket tournament. The player also announced that he will continue to compete in ODI, Test and tournament matches. His decision came two days after Bangladesh was eliminated from the 2022 Asian Cup.
“I would like to announce my retirement from T20 INTERNATIONALS and focus on the Experimental and ODI formats of the game. I’ll be there to play the franchises when I get the chance. Looking forward to proudly representing my country in two formats-MR15,” the cricketer tweeted.
The decision to retire from the T20 format of the Bangladeshi player was made at a time when the T20 World Cup was just over a month away. Mushfiqur experienced a below-average form in the T20 format. His last half-century in this format was in the T20 World Cup last year when he scored 57 goals (without going out) against Sri Lanka.
inside Asian CupHe scored 1 and 4 in two matches where the team drew and lost.
This is the second blow for Team Bangladesh after opening star Tamim Iqbal also retired from T20Is earlier in the year. He gives almost the same reason to focus more on longer formats.
Mushfiqur played a total of 102 T20 games for the team that hit 1500 runs in this format. His highest score in the format was 72* while he hit sixty. Cricket’s best year as a T20 player was in 2018 when he scored 397 runs with an average of 30.53.
New captain Shakib Al Hasan has a tedious task ahead of him trying to fill the huge void that Mushfiqur’s absence will especially create in the midfield of the team. The team’s next task is the T20 World Cup in Australia and the team will certainly be absent from 2 formidable opponents in the championship.
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