C T Online Desk: Bangladesh batting coach Jamie Siddons believes Mahmudul Hasan Joy’s maiden Test hundred was a result of patience and great gameplan.
Joy emerged as the first Bangladeshi to score a Test hundred against South Africa – in just his third Test.
The right-handed batter is now only the third, after Rahul Dravid and Sachin Tendulkar, to play 300-plus deliveries in an innings in South Africa, and also outside Asia, in the longest format.
Joy fell as the last Bangladesh wicket in the first innings on day three of the ongoing Test match against hosts South Africa in Durban.
The 21-year old opener faced 326 balls to score 137 and remained at the crease for more than eight hours.
Joy found support from the lower middle-order and shared a 33-run partnership with Yasir Ali and a 51-run stand with Mehedi Hasan Miraz.
Earlier to that he had put on 82 for the fifth wicket with Liton Das, Bangladesh’s best partnership of the innings.
Bangladesh fell short by 69 runs to Proteas’ first innings tally.
“Today’s innings was of patience and great gameplan. He stuck to what he knows. He didn’t try to play any expansive shots that weren’t in his repertoire. We are really proud of the way he batted. Batting through the whole innings is special for Bangladesh. I am not sure there have been many better innings for Bangladesh in Test cricket,” said Siddons to the media Saturday.
“Things might have fallen into places for him with the spinners having to bowl most of the afternoon. There was only 10 overs of new-ball bowling. You rarely see his levels of patience from our batsmen. There’s always some loose batting. Although, in this innings, the batsmen didn’t play a bad shot to get out. It was all really good bowling and one bad run out. Everyone was patient and playing to their strength. Joy manipulated the field quite well. He hit over the top when the field was up. When they put a fielder back, he knocked it for one. He believed he could bat for six hours. All the young players have self-belief. We just need bigger scores more often from them,” the Bangladesh coach added.
With South Africa having a 75-run lead, Siddons pressed on the need for Bangladesh to take early wickets on day four to bounce back in the game.
A score of around 250 or more will be a hard task to chase, believes the former Australia cricketer.
“Three or four wickets in the first session, we are back in the game. If we over-attack, they score quickly and the game could get away from us. We are a bit behind the game so we can’t concede so many. I thought it was a 280-300 wicket, not a 360 wicket. We have to find a way to get those 60 runs back, which means we need wickets in the first session. If they get 80-90 runs in the first session, we are well and truly behind the game. Then we are looking at whether to save us. The light has cost us a few overs already. Today was another example of it getting quite dark around 3:30 or 4pm,” said Siddons.
“A total of 250 will be a hard chase. It is a difficult Test which is starting to turn quite a bit. We saw Shanto (Nazmul Hossain) was spinning it today. He is not one of our best spinners. Their spinners bowled well. If we want to chase anything, (Keshav) Maharaj will be difficult to face. The ball is starting to stay low with the quicks. It is a really good cricket wicket. If we weren’t 70 runs behind, we’d be backing ourselves to bowl on that wicket and chase the runs,” he added.
