Craig Ervine eyes successful series in familiar conditions

Dhaka – The interim Test captain of Zimbabwe, Craig Ervine, is eying a successful series in Bangladesh in the familiar conditions.

The visitors are playing cricket in Bangladesh on a regular basis and they played a series here last year, too.

“We’ve come to Bangladesh after a successful home series against Sri Lanka. It gave us good momentum after a long break.  We’re familiar with the local (Bangladesh) conditions as we travel here on a regular basis and obviously, we’ve come here to win,” Ervine told the media during their first practice session at the academy ground on Sunday after coming to Bangladesh.

Bangladesh are currently enduring a bad patch in Test cricket as they have lost all of their last three Tests by innings margin.

But, Ervine said they are not bothered about the performance of Bangladesh.

“Putting their results aside, we just have to concentrate on our processes and make sure we are not caught on the back foot on the first day of the Test match. We’ve a few new guys in the team. We’re trying to get them as comfortable as possible,” Ervine further told the media.

“I’m missing (Sean) Williams, (Kyle) Jarvis and (Tendai) Chatara. They’re big players for us. But it opens the doors for other guys. There’re opportunities for them to step up. Prince Masvaure and Kevin Kasuza opened against Sri Lanka and we’re calling upon them to do the same job in Bangladesh. It’s a challenge for them to accept and take it on,” he said.

The series will begin with the one-off Test starting on February 22 at Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium. After that, a three-match ODI series will be held in Sylhet on March 1, 3 and 6 respectively. The two teams will then battle for a two-match T20I series in Dhaka on March 9 and 11.UNB