Tamim Iqbal won’t be able to participate in the upcoming T20I series on the tour of India as he wants to stay with his wife for the birth of the couple’s second child.
Tamim was named in the squad which was announced initially, but he let the selectors know that he couldn’t go on the tour after which his name was taken out.
Imrul Kayes, another left-handed opening batsman, has been drafted into the squad on Tamim’s place.
According to Minhajul Abedin, the chief selector of Bangladesh, Tamim was expected to be available for the T20I series and the first test and his plan was to return home ahead of the second test only.
But, now he has decided he would stay home for the entire T20I series and it’s possible that he might not make it to India for the test series either.
Tamim Iqbal has not played for Bangladesh for quite a while. Earlier this year, he had requested the selectors that he wanted to spend some time away from the game and had wished not to be selected for the test match against Afghanistan and the tri-series involving Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Zimbabwe.
In the absence of Tamim, the young opener Shadman Islam had opened for Bangladesh in the Afghanistan test. While Shadman had registered a duck in the first innings, he had scored a gritty 41 in the second and will probably retain his place if Tamim doesn’t return for the India tests.
Bangladesh, so far, have only announced their T20I squad for the India tour. The test squad is likely to be announced in a few days. Here is the T20I squad –
Shakib Al Hasan (C), Liton Das, Imrul Kayes, Soumya Sarkar, Mohammad Naim, Mushfiqur Rahim, Mahmudullah, Afif Hossain, Mosaddek Hossain, Aminul Islam, Arafat Sunny, Al-Amin Hossain, Mustafizur Rahman, Shafiul Islam
