Five years and a few days ago, Taskin Ahmed, while talking to media at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium, broke down in tears as he was excluded from Bangladesh鈥檚 15-member squad for the ICC 2019 World Cup due to an ankle injury.
On Tuesday, the Bangladesh Cricket Board announced their 15-member squad for the forthcoming 2024 T20 World Cup, and Taskin, despite his rib injury which he sustained last Friday while fielding in the fourth T20I against Zimbabwe, was included in the 15-member squad with the role of vice-captain.
His inclusion not only showed his rise to being the leader of Bangladesh鈥檚 fast-bowling attack but also a cultural shift from BCB, that they were now willing to carry uncertain players to global events, something they have not done in the past.
Ahead of the ICC 2011 World Cup, Mashrafe Bin Mortaza was snubbed from competing in the global event at home, which had also seen the pacer cry at the SBNS 鈥� an image that will live on in Bangladesh cricket history.
After Taskin in 2019, last year, Tamim Iqbal opted out of the ODI World Cup, following ample discussions and criticism regarding his injury as it made his participation in all the matches of the tournament unsure, leading to the staging of an off-the-field thriller before, during, and even after the tournament.
In both of the aforementioned cases, Mashrafe and Tamim were undisputed starters, but that did not prevent BCB from avoiding any form of risk, as they did for Taskin, demonstrating their shift in mentality as they are willing to do anything to get their best players to the World Cup because the right-handed pacer is not guaranteed to recover before the tournament.
鈥楢s far as I know, he [Taskin] will recover at some time during the World Cup. This time at the World Cup, you can carry an injured player and then if he doesn鈥檛 recover, then we can bring in a replacement,鈥� Bangladesh national team chief selector Gazi Ashraf Hossain Lipu told the media on Tuesday.
While Bangladesh have their fail-safe ready in Hasan Mahmud in case Taskin doesn鈥檛 get fit but at least this time around, they did not snub a player because of an injury at the last moment.
