Bangladesh's routing of Pakistan in the Dhaka Test this week was on the back of fast bowling. Bangladesh's quicks combined to take ten wickets in the match, with speedster Nahid Rana taking his second five-wicket haul in the format. He now has picked up three five-fors in international cricket in the last two months.
Rana is the poster boy for Bangladesh's fast-bowling resurgence, which has now spanned more than five years. Taskin Ahmed and Ebadot Hossain, who were part of the three-man attack, are also architects of this journey. Taskin took two wickets to spark Pakistan's batting collapse on the third morning, and then two more crucial scalps on the fifth afternoon. This was his first Test in 18 months.
This trio is part of a wider group of bowlers, coaches and senior players who have cultivated, flourished and resurrected a dying art in Bangladesh, recently. Bangladesh can now rely on fast bowling in both red and white-ball formats. It is also visible progress, with fast bowlers now winning more Player-of-the-Match and Player-of-the-Series awards than ever before.
Bangladesh's bowling average and strike rate had crashed significantly in the last ten years. It easily reflects what fast bowling meant to the Bangladesh team management from 2016 to 2021.
In the second Test against West Indies in the home series in 2018, Bangladesh picked four frontline spinners and didn't bowl a single over of pace across 96 overs. In the Test before that, they had bowled just four overs of pace. Against England, too, in the second Test in 2016, Bangladesh bowled only three overs of seam. As they were winning all these Tests, Bangladesh's spin-only strategy was quite straightforward. Raging turners were prepared at home, with the playing XI loaded with spinners.
The results, however, weren't always desirable. Bangladesh did beat England and Australia at home, but they also lost to Afghanistan, Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka quite emphatically. The likes of Nathan Lyon, Rashid Khan, Sajid Khan and Rahkeem Cornwall outbowled Bangladesh's spinners in Dhaka and Chattogram.
The irony was that Mashrafe Mortaza was one of the most powerful figures in Bangladesh at the time, while West Indies legend Courtney Walsh was Bangladesh's fast-bowling coach during this period.
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During an interview last year, former captain Tamim Iqbal mentioned how Mominul Haque was one of the first characters to end the dark age of fast bowling in Bangladesh. He said that he would often ask why Mominul employed three fast bowlers when he was leading domestic first-class teams like East Zone and Chattogram Division.
"When I asked him why are you picking fast bowlers, asking curators to make pacy and bouncy tracks, Mominul told me that otherwise fast bowling would be dead in Bangladesh," Tamim said at the time. "He brought that mindset to the Test team when he was the captain. I think Mominul deserves some credit for helping fast bowling's rebirth in the team."
Mominul had limited success as captain, but the most important one was Bangladesh beating New Zealand in Mount Maunganui in 2022. Ebadot took a six-wicket haul in New Zealand's second innings, while Taskin and left-arm quick Shoriful Islam played pivotal roles in the victory.
Mominul had head coach Russell Domingo to support his push for pace in the line-up at the time. Domingo, in one of his earliest press conferences, had committed that he would support fast bowling even if it was for overseas conditions.
However, nobody with more authority than Domingo and Mominul believed that fast bowling had to be brought back. The Bangladesh team around that time was led by then BCB president Nazmul Hassan, who was heavily influenced by Chandika Hathurusinghe, even though he had left his position of head coach in 2017. It was Hathurusinghe who had influenced the switch towards the spin-heavy strategy in 2016, so even after he left, the "spin-only at home" tactic remained front and centre.
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More than Mominul's nudge towards fast bowling, it is Taskin's epiphany in 2021 that is regarded as the turning point in Bangladesh cricket. After being sidelined due to injuries and poor form since 2018, Taskin became an afterthought in Bangladesh's plans. He became restless when Covid-19 hit. Stuck at home, Taskin wondered: is this the end of my cricket career?
He contacted long-time collaborator Mahbub Ali Zaki, the BCB bowling coach who passed away earlier this year. Taskin called up friends to open their gym and cricket grounds for him. He trained in sandpits on the outskirts of Dhaka. It resulted in some wickets and a return to the Bangladesh team in early 2021 after three-and-a-half years.
"I think it all started with my comeback during the Covid days," Taskin said in an interview to ESPNcricinfo last week. "Everyone saw how hard work and process can make anything happen. Everybody started to follow the same path. We became consistent regarding the process. We also have a strong bond off the field. We are having dinner together, we are going out together, we share each other's experiences."
Taskin's rise from the ashes became a big source of inspiration for the other fast bowlers. Ebadot, whose bowling average hovered around 80 after ten Tests till the end of 2021, tweaked his bowling action to deliver the six-for against New Zealand in Mount Maunganui.
Shoriful was fast-tracked from the 2020 Under-19 World Cup-winning side. Hasan Mahmud rose through pretty much the same route. Rana, meanwhile, came up after a bagful of wickets in the domestic first-class tournaments. He was quick from the onset, but took a big leap in Test cricket in Pakistan in 2024.
The one constant from Bangladesh's earlier generation of fast bowling to this one is Mustafizur Rahman. The left-arm quick who burst into ODI cricket in 2015 steadily built himself for the white-ball format. The team management decided very early that they were not going to deploy him in red-ball cricket, mainly due to injuries and workload. To Mustafizur's credit, he has maintained high standards in white-ball formats since then.
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Despite the push for turning pitches at home, credit must also go to the BCB for also appointing renowned fast bowling coaches. Charl Langeveldt was around for a short while after Walsh before Ottis Gibson took over. But it was Allan Donald's arrival that launched Bangladesh's fast bowling into a higher orbit, particularly in the ODIs in South Africa in 2022, when they won the series 2-1.
Donald was a more hands-on coach, who oversaw not just the expansion of Bangladesh's fast-bowling group, but also identified the next line of fast bowlers like Rejaur Rahman Raja, Musfik Hasan and Rana. After Donald, came Andre Adams for around a year, and then Shaun Tait in 2025.
By many accounts, Tait has had a calming influence on the overall fast-bowling unit with his man-management skills. He is also a vocal advocate of his group, suggesting recently that fast bowlers don't get the credit for becoming match-winners.
Taskin and Rana put together the perfect storm in Dhaka this week. They struggled on the second day, before firing up on the third morning. Then came the fifth day, when the duo blew Pakistan away in a fashion that will be remembered in Bangladesh for a long time. What was also remarkable was the pitch that the Bangladesh team management chose for the first Test.
For many years, the Mirpur pitch was the subject of much speculation, but it was always spin first. This time though, the tide has turned. As compared to 2016, fast bowling in Bangladesh is now travelling at 150kph.