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Mushfiqur Rahim named Bangladesh captain

Cricket Tragic

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Shakib lost his humility

There will be those who condemn this as a grotesque overreaction by the BCB to a lacklustre tour. Such a conclusion, however, is misleading and ignores a pattern of poor behaviour by both the captain and his deputy. ShakibÃÔ fall from grace is in fact the culmination of a series of acts by the Bangladesh skipper which could at best be described as naý×e and at worst considered wilfully arrogant. Rumours of indiscipline and discontent have been circulating for the best part of the last twelve months. We are told by the BCB's Jalal Yunus that Tamim Iqbal argued with the coach during the Zimbabwe tour. Shakib and Tamim are both fermenting discontent in the squad and are rumoured to have dined separately from the rest of the team on that same tour. Both men are also rumoured to have insisted on business class plane tickets when travelling for specialist treatment abroad. Moreover, a former member of the coaching staff recently told of how during a crucial ODI, while the top order battled to set a score, their captain Shakib was napping in the dressing room for a significant portion of the Bangladesh innings. :hysterical::hysterical: Shakib also publicly accused the selectors of picking a squad without consulting him (an allegation denied by chief selector Akram Khan) and declined an invitation in November last year to captain the side on series-by-series basis, preferring instead a longer term appointment. Shakib's indiscretions, however, are merely the symptoms of a deeper malaise affecting Bangladesh's captain; fundamentally Shakib has unfortunately lost his humility. When the allrounder from Magura first led Bangladesh against the West Indies in 2009, he was just 22 years old. Just three years earlier, he had been playing under-19 cricket. While his under-19 contemporaries from England and Australia were beginning careers in first class cricket, Shakib had become his nation's captain. The period thereafter coincided with his rise to becoming the world's number one ranked allrounder. It would be difficult for anyone to remain unaffected by such a rapid rise and the attention, adoration and responsibility that comes with it. To believe that Shakib would remain humble in such an environment was perhaps optimistic. In modern cricket arrogance and confidence has become almost synonymous with success. We expect and admire bravado and bombast in our cricketers and often mistakenly view this as proof of being competitive; a vital ingredient in sporting prowess. Yet it was not always thus. Some of the greatest cricketers have achieved profound success in a quiet and understated way. Indeed even today while the likes of Broad, Pietersen, Sehwag and Yuvraj play with aggression and swagger, others like Bresnan, Cook, Dravid and Tendulkar quietly achieve as much, if not more, in more understated fashion. Shakib and Tamim may have believed that emulating the Sehwags and Pietersens is the best way forward. In truth, aggression and egotism are not the only way of achieving admiration and success or even the best way of doing so.

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