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On Monday, February 12, the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) appointed Najmul Hossain Shanto as the permanent captain of the men’s national team in all three formats. The announcement came after BCB’s ninth Board of Directors meeting, wherein it was also decided that Najmul Hossain Shanto will lead for a year, as per the President Nazmul Hassan Papon.
Apart from appointing Najmul Hossain Shanto as the new permanent captain, the BCB picked Gazi Ashraf Hossain as the new chief selector of the men’s national team and brought in Hannan Sarkar as the new selector. With these two new additions in the selection committee, Minhajul Abedin will leave the chief selector’s post after eight years, along with the former captain Habibul Bashar exiting as a selector.
On their recent limited overs tour to New Zealand, Najmul Hossain Shanto captained Bangladesh to their first ODI win in the island nation, despite the series ending in favour of the hosts with a 2-1 margin. He also led Bangladesh to a 1-1 T20I series result against New Zealand in their home, in the absence of the regular captain, Shakib Al Hasan.
As per the report from ESPNcricinfo, BCB had considered Shakib Al Hasan for the ODI captaincy role of Bangladesh after he had spoken about giving it up following the CWC campaign last year. But when he had informed them about the condition in his eye, ruling himself out of the upcoming series against Sri Lanka, Najmul Hossain Shanto was given the reins.
Moreover, Chandika Hathurusinghe, the head coach of Bangladesh, had praised the captaincy of Najmul Hossain Shanto after he led the team admirably during the New Zealand tour.
