Kolkata: Bengal will start their campaign in the prestigious Syed Mustaq Ali(East Zone) T-20 tournament against Tripura on January 31st. The other teams which are set to play against Bengal are Orissa, Assam and Jharkhand.
Under the guidance of coach Sairaj Bahutle, the Bengal team have started their practice for the tournament. They played a practice match against Barisha on Thursday and won it comprehensively by 30 runs. Except for the practice matches Bengal team was concentrating on situation practices too. Coach Bahutule was giving ten balls to his two batsman and they had to score 35 runs in these deliveries. He was setting most of the players at the off-side the batsmen need to score those runs between those fielders.
Bengal will play all their matches at Eden Gardens and in the last match between India & England everybody saw that the pitch was helping the fast bowlers. Bengal coach Sairaj Bahutule was not concerned about the pitch.” We have a bunch of good pacers in our team and I think the wicket will help us a lot. We have some good all-rounders too and we will prepare ourselves as per the situation demands.” Sairaj said.
The excitement and hype regarding the tournament can reach a new height as Indian legend Mahendra Singh Dhoni said that he’ll like to play for Jharkhand in the domestic cups to keep himself fit for the upcoming Indian Premier League and Champions Trophy, so after India’s ongoing series against the Britishers culminate on the 1st of February, he could play the tournament and Bengal might get some tastes of helicopter shot. Regarding this question the Bengal gaffer added,” If Dhoni joins Jharkhand their strength will definitely increase and the competitiveness of the tournament will reach to a different level.