Tamim Iqbal, who was named as Bangladesh's captain for the Sri Lanka tour, talked to the reporters in Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport before departing for Sri Lanka to play a three match ODI series against the Lankans. Tamim hoped to do well in the series despite missing a few senior players in the squad.

“This series is very important for us. This side has a lot to prove. A lot of important players cannot join us in the series due to injury. As a result, this will be a challenging series for us. It is going to be tough in for us on Sri Lankan conditions. But, we have seen the previous series and we did well against them. Hopefully, we can overcome this time as well.” said the dashing opener.

Tamim had no idea he was going to be captaining the side until the last moment when Mashrafee Bin Mortaza said he had suffered an injury during the training session and had to sit out this tournament. Bangladesh had a few players from the World Cup side missing from this series with the likes of Shakib Al Hasan and Saifuddin not playing. Mahmudullah Riyad was still not a hundred percent fit as well, but he will be accompanying the squad. However, with such adversities, Tamim was still positive about the outcome of the matches as players like Taskin Ahmed and Forhad Reza were brought in for reinforcements.

“I am not thinking so much about these. If we concentrate too much on the negatives, we will face such negative situations. We have to be positive and that is what I trying to be as well. I have to be positive.” concluded Tamim.