Habibul Bashar has recently moved into a new role as BCB appointed him as the programme coordinator of the game development. That means the former national team captain has left the women鈥檚 wing, where he worked as the head for one year. Bashar, who formerly worked as both men鈥檚 and women鈥檚 team selector, talked to 抖阴精品鈥檚 Saifullah Bin Anowar about his new role, his success, and the shortcomings of the previous one. Here are some excerpts:
抖阴精品: Can you give us some idea on your new role?
Habibul Bashar: As I鈥檝e been moved to game development, obviously the BCB is thinking that I鈥檒l be more useful here. They鈥檙e thinking that the department will be more enriched by me. Basically, I was moved so that I can work on more aspects, can give the programme more speed, and eventually make it better in the future. I will basically coordinate the overall programme.
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NA: What prompted you to take up this role?
Bashar: There is something called job satisfaction, right? To work in a developing sector is like that. I played for the national team, then worked as a selector. When I was a selector, I spent a lot of time with the high-performance unit.
Everyone gets into the national side after getting ready, which is not the case for developing players. It always gives me pleasure to work with the fringe players, as you will get the opportunity to build them. There are many scopes of teaching. Whatever the capability I鈥檝e got to teach, I think it will be used well.
And you can call it the basement of Bangladesh cricket. If the base is strong, everything that follows will be easy and well.
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NA: How was your experience of working with women?
Bashar: That was a different challenge. The thing is, the number of players coming into the women鈥檚 game is not as much as the men鈥檚 game. So this was a different challenge, as it was beyond my experience. But I started some work on how I could improve the sector. I tried to increase the number of games they play, as there are fewer opportunities. I made sure that the Premier League starts on time. This season has started at a fantastic time. It used to be held in June-July; as a result, almost half of the games got washed out.
As the men鈥檚 league was also being held at this time, the women鈥檚 league used to push further. But I said, 鈥榃hy will a tournament not be held because of another tournament?鈥�
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NA: What will be your success and otherwise, if you are to point out?
Bashar: I was able to get more girls within the contracts, which was necessary. The tournaments have grown bigger; the number of games has increased.
When I got the charge, my primary goal was to increase the number of players coming through the system. I鈥檝e always said this: the number of players in the women鈥檚 cricket pipeline is not enough. We need more players. As other countries have moved forward, there is no option for us but to increase the number of players. So, the more tournaments are held, the more games are played, and the more players will come.
And if you say about the lackings, I鈥檇 say the results were inconsistent. When I came to the role, the team was relatively new in terms of the experience. Some of the seniors were gone, so the team was kind of rebuilding. I had to work with the team. But I鈥檝e initiated the process; hopefully within a year or two, the number of women cricketers will be increased by many.
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NA: Do you think one year is enough to work in a sector?
Bashar: Yes, one year is not enough. You need at least two to three years to get the desired results if you start a job. What I began may need one or two more years to get the results. In that sense, it鈥檚 not ideal. But I鈥檓 on the cricket board; I can be in touch with them. I鈥檒l be around if they need any help. But it would鈥檝e been nice if I got one or two more years.
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NA: You seemed pretty disappointed when the national team missed the opportunity of a direct qualification into the World Cup鈥�
Bashar: (Laughs) Yeah, I was a bit disappointed. But that鈥檚 okay; it can happen. Hopefully they will go through the Qualifier and will be in the World Cup.
