Bangladesh skipper Najmul Hossain believes the Australia series is in the past as they prepare to take on Afghanistan in the one-off Test series, scheduled at Abu Dhabi from October 9. Bangladesh head into the Test series on the back of historic Test win over Australia in Darwin and ended the two-match series with 1-1 scoreline, after Australia levelled it at Mackay. “I think as you mentioned we had a good series against Australia, but I believe that is past,” Najmul told reporters ahead of their lone Test at Abu Dhabi on Thursday. “These are new conditions against a new opponent and so we have to plan accordingly. The conditions here obviously are different but some of the players came a bit earlier and played one practice match so that will help to adjust,” he said. “So I believe players are ready and they will adjust to the conditions and the opponent as well,” he said. Bangladesh face the challenge of adapting to the heat in the United Arab Emirates, considering they have never played a Test match in this part of the world. Their only previous experience of playing in the UAE has come in white-ball cricket, and that too in day-night matches. Najmul, who recovered well from his fever to join the team afterwards, acknowledged the heat but said they don’t want to put that as an excuse. “I think the preparation has been good. The conditions are a little hot, that will be the case. But as professional players, we don’t want to see it as an excuse at all. I think the players are not thinking too much about these things either,” said Najmul. “And personally my recovery has been good, Alhamdulillah. I am healthy now. I have practised for the last two days, I am feeling good,” he said, adding that he is expecting a slow wicket which will be good for batting. “I had a chance to see the wicket yesterday, I’ll have another look today. It looked good, maybe a little slow. But I think it will be good for batting. So I hope it will be a very good Test match,” he added. Najmul added that Bangladesh, who are in the hunt for a place in the ICC Test Championship final, are reaping the reward of hard work, growing day-by-day as a Test-playing nation on the back of impressive performances in the longer-format. “I think during the last couple of years we’ve been playing some good cricket, especially in this format and that’s what we wanted as a Test team,” said Najmul. “We have been working really hard back home on how we are going to improve our Test cricket and in the last couple of years we’ve been doing great. “I believe we need to do a lot of work to improve our skill especially in this format and by playing against different opponents in different conditions,” he said. “We have to be consistent and as I mentioned we played some good cricket, but still we need to improve a lot of things,” he said. Najmul added that though there are a lot of shorter format games, he still feels Test cricket has its own place and he will choose longer-format over shorter-format games. “Nowadays it’s hard (to keep motivation to play Test cricket in a world surrounded by shorter format games) but we can’t do anything with that. But as a professional cricketer and when we were growing up we all wanted to play Test cricket. So if you ask most of the cricketers, they all will say to you that we all wanted to play Test cricket. So Test cricket is always very special for a player,” said Najmul. “We all love to play Test cricket and I wanted to play more Test matches rather than the shorter format,” he said.
