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Nazmul Hasan, the newly elected president of the Bangladesh Cricket Board, faced the media on Thursday and expressed his new objectives for the present tenure, eyeing to bring some major changes in the BCB constitution.
Nazmul was elected as the BCB president unanimously as the other 22 board directors gave their consent when his name was proposed for the post.
Being elected as the BCB president for his third term, Nazmul is willing to take the Bangladesh one-day team to the top five of the ICC rankings, where the Tigers are presently at seventh.
He is also willing to complete the construction works of Sheikh Hasina international cricket stadium in Purbachol, Dhaka, to host ICC events in the next cycle.
Nazmul, attending a press briefing at the press conference room of the Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium on Thursday afternoon, said that in the first meeting with his fellow directors, he gave a clear sign that everybody must work hard to take Bangladesh Cricket to the next level.
“Presently, out of the three formats, we are more or less good in ODIs, but we are not good enough. Now we are in the seventh position, above two former world champions- Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Our next target is to reach among the top five teams so that we don’t drop down too deep. To break in among the top five, we have to overcome some tough opponents. Currently, that is our target because we have the infrastructure and the facilities to jump that high and other teams are far ahead. That is the reality,” Nazmul told the reporters on Thursday.
One of Nazmul’s main goals is to complete the construction work of Sheikh Hasina stadium in Purbachol so that Bangladesh can bid for ICC events from the next cycle.
“Our first priority is the Sheikh Hasina Stadium. We have to start it as soon as possible. Because in our application to ICC for hosting tournaments, we have listed this stadium. Without completing the stadium, we will not get the hosting rights. This is our top priority,” he said.
He also hinted that the organizations which are not sports bodies but still have voting rights in the BCB election might not get this privilege anymore.
“I have told all the directors that they must tell me their observations about bringing changes into the constitution in the next meeting. There are so many clubs, but not all clubs have voting rights. Rather, there are names of various organizations which have no involvement with cricket. I would like to bring a change in this aspect,” said Nazmul.
“There are some clauses of our constitution which are conflicting with the formation of regional cricket associations. We will work on that too,” he added.
Nazmul is also hopeful about setting up new regional cricket academies for a strong pipeline of cricketers.
“With the regional cricket association comes the infrastructure development. There will be multiple cricket academies, and out of that, three will be dedicated to batting, pace bowling, and spin bowling. These are not for national team players, for the development of future cricketers. The academies will have coaches around the year, could be someone local or from abroad,” said Nazmul, who secured the highest number of votes in his category.
But Nazmul said that he did not ask for votes, “I did not ask for votes from anyone. I tried to test the voters. There are many whom we might think as an opposition, but for the sake of cricket, they also voted for me.”
He is also ready to include the two candidates who lost in the election, former captain Khaled Mashud and Cricket Advisor of BKSP Nazmul Abedeen Fahim, with the board.
“Election is a different ball game. You need a whole new kind of preparation. I guess they contested without proper homework,” the BCB President said.
Nazmul clearly indicated that he is going to take some unpopular decisions which might not help him win the votes, but he will take those steps to make BCB a more professional body and the Bangladesh team more successful.
“If I get only three votes in the next term, still I will do this. I said to everyone that if you think that you have done enough, you are wrong. We want to make cricket grounds, not stadiums, where cricket can be played throughout the year,” said Nazmul.
