Speculation is rife that Bangladesh all-rounder Mahmudullah Riyad may soon bring curtains down on his illustrious Test career.
No wonder the 35-year-old is at the wrong side of his age, but he still appears fit, given the fact that he smashed an unbeaten 150 — his fifth Test ton and highest in this format of the game — in the ongoing Harare match.
However, both Mahmudllah and the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) are tight-lipped on the T20 skipper’s retirement plan.
Mahmudullah was out of the Test setup for more than 17 months after last seen in the Rawalpindi Test in 2020. It was his second omission from the Test side in the past four years. He was also out of Bangladesh’s 100th Test in Sri Lanka.
The speculation seemed to have erupted from the T20 skipper’s emotional outburst following his superb performance in the Harare Test.
Sources close to the all-rounder told UNB that he’s determined not to prolong his Test career and might announce his retirement at the end of the Harare match.
The digital news outlet has learnt that Mahmudullah had announced his decision to the teammates before the game on Day 3 of the Test in Harare. But surprisingly, he kept mum in the post-day video message sent to the media by the Board.
BCB president Nazmul Hassan, however, told a leading national daily that the rumours came as a surprise to him as “Mahmudullah, right before flying to Zimbabwe, expressed his consent to play in every format of cricket for Bangladesh”.
“He didn’t inform me anything officially about it. I came to know from someone else. But it’s not acceptable to me. It’s unusual. We are playing a Test now. The match is yet to end,” the BCB boss said.
“He was a last-minute inclusion to the Test side because he wrote to us that he would play Test if he got a chance,” Nazmul said. “We asked every national team member to inform us which format of the game they would prefer to play, and Mahmudullah told us he was up for every format.”
Nazmul also said he had personally contacted Mahmudullah recently to ask him about his plan for his Test career. “He told me he would play Test and ready to bowl as well if the team needed him.”
A media report suggested that the decision of the head coach, Russell Domingo, to not consider Mahmudullah for Tests made the all-rounder upset, and he was too eager to prove his mettle as a Test player.
Now, after hitting an unbeaten 150 in Harare, the all-rounder felt this is the right time to keep his whites away.
As per the latest information available, the BCB asked has Mahmudullah to reconsider his decision.
The all-rounder was an integral part of the Bangladesh national team in all formats of the game from 2009 to 2017. But he lost his place in the Test squad more than once in recent years.
His lean display in the past two years in Tests prompted the BCB to consider him only for the white-ball cricket. In the last central contract, he was handed an agreement only for the white-ball games.
Mahmudullah got his Test cap back in 2009 against West Indies. In the first Test of his career at Kingston, Mahmudullah bagged eight wickets in the second innings, which is his only five-wicket haul in Tests.
Including the ongoing Test, Mahmudullah played a total of 50 Tests for the Tigers and scored 1,949 runs till the first innings of the Harare Test. He has five Test centuries under his belt.
The all-rounder also played 197 ODIs and 89 T20Is and scored 4,410 and 1,507 runs, and bagged 76 and 31 wickets, respectively.
Source: United News of Bangladesh
