Bangladesh’s Mehidy Hasan said on Saturday that he dreams of replicating his 2016 Under-19 World Cup performance on the big stage.
Mehidy came into the spotlight by grabbing the Player-of-the-Tournament award in the biggest age-level global event, making 242 runs and picking 12 wickets. However, with time, he became the leading off-spinner of his country. His potential with the bat took a back seat, but lately he has developed his batting to such an extent that he can surely be considered a full-fledged all-rounder. He looks set to make a mark, leading both with bat and ball with an all-round performance against the Afghans in their tournament opener in Dharamsala.
“If I can perform all-round in a big tournament, it will be a huge achievement for me and for the team as well. I certainly have that dream of translating the performance of the 2016 Under-19 World Cup,” Mehidy told reporters at the post-match.
Mehidy, who was recently promoted to number three after making two fifties in the warm-ups against Sri Lanka and England, added that he has been preparing mentally since the India series to score runs regularly.
“I am scoring runs from the India series because I have worked really hard on my batting. I was thinking about how I can bat well because if I can, the team will benefit, and I prepared mentally for that. The team supported me a lot and played me in different positions, and that is a big thing for me,” said Mehidy.
“Adapting is the key, and not only me. If you want to achieve something, you need to adapt. I always batted at eight, and there you cannot always score runs because you have fewer balls to face. But I prepared mentally in such a way that if I get an opportunity, I could give my hundred percent and am always thinking about what to do,” he said.
“In different positions, the situation is different, and what I feel is that because I have been given an opportunity, I should seize it. It is better to bat anywhere up in the order than to come down and bat at eight because I believe that I can bat. Certainly, there are problems, but I don’t take that to my head. I have to perform for the team at any position because at the end of the day, we play for our team, and today everyone in Bangladesh is happy because we won the game.
Mehidy revealed that skipper Shakib al Hasan’s advice during the drinks break helped him get his bowling back on track.
“I didn’t bowl well in the first over and gave away nine runs, and at that point, I was a bit nervous. Shakib bhai told me not to bowl with a negative mindset; that I have to have a positive mind. In this kind of big tournament, you have to have a positive mindset, and there is no problem if I leak runs, but the batters need to charge me and try to score runs. These little things help a lot,” he said.
Shoriful Islam echoed Mehidy’s sentiment on replicating U19 success on the biggest stage but reminded of what’s different in senior men’s cricket. “That was U-19s… now it is the ODI World Cup, the main World Cup. The difference is that there are world-class batsmen here. The U-19s also has good batsmen, but not like this. Every batsman here is very good; they charge at the ball when the bowler doesn’t bowl the correct length here.”
