Najmul Hossain rues Bangladesh’s batting-order experimentations

Bangladesh’s stand-in skipper Najmul Hossain Shanto said on Saturday that the team would’ve been better served if they hadn’t experimented with their batting order in the World Cup.It is understood that upon Bangladesh Cricket Board president Nazmul Hassan’s intervention following their defeat against Netherlands, the team management was forced to stop any further experimentation in their last three games against Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Australia. They stuck to a settled batting order and didn’t resort to pushing Mehidy Hasan Miraz up the order – a move that didn’t earn them any dividends in the tournament.Despite being groomed as Bangaladesh’s No.3 batter, Najmul himself had to bat at different positions because of the team management’s decisions to experiment with their batting combinations.”To be honest, it is better if we don’t (shuffle the batting order). But sometimes you have to do (shuffle) against certain teams, according to their strengths. But I think the less we did it, (the better it would have been). There was a lot of (shuffling) in the World Cup but it was done with a positive intent. If we didn’t do it at all, it would have been even better,” Najmul said after their eight-wicket defeat to Australia in their last league match in Pune.”Nobody complained about the batting order. They were happy with their positions. There may have been a different outcome if we had batted in our normal positions. Maybe we could have got better results. But the opposite could also be true. There’s no point talking about it now,” he said.Najmul, who led Bangladesh against India and Australia in the absence of Shakib Al Hasan, added that he would be happy to take up the role on a full-time basis in the future.”We couldn’t win either of the matches (that I captained). There was pressure to handle against two big teams. I think there was a lot to learn, which will help me in the future. I have been leading teams for a while now. I think personally I’m ready. If the opportunity presents itself, I will try to do it well,” he said.Najmul also felt Bangladesh need to prepare sporting wickets for home ODI and T20Is to scale up their batting. Though they scored 306/8 against Australia on Saturday, the skipper felt there’s score to make scoring 300s on a regular basis a habit.”We are not a poor batting unit. We came here well-prepared but we didn’t get the result. We want sporting wickets during home ODIs and T20Is. Bowlers will learn how to defend 300 runs on a good wicket. I’m sure the board is thinking about these types of wickets,” he said.”We made 307 against this (Australia) bowling line-up, so definitely our batters had the confidence. If we didn’t have those two run-outs and had a big partnership in the middle overs, maybe we could have scored 350. But it’s also true that we need to play on better pitches. We know how to score 260 but we need to grow the habit of scoring 300 plus,” he added.