With no international opponent available, the Bangladesh women's cricket team will head into the upcoming ICC Women's Cricket World Cup without playing any bilateral series. Despite efforts, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and India have all been unable to offer a series slot, leaving Nigar Sultana Joty and her team relying solely on domestic preparation.
In the absence of competitive international fixtures, the Bangladesh women's team has focused on intensive training camps and matches against boys' age-level teams to simulate high-level competition. They recently completed a camp in Sylhet where they played four matches against the Sylhet Under-15 boys' team. A further tournament is planned against the national Under-15 boys’ side as part of the next training phase.
Bangladesh captain Nigar Sultana acknowledged the gap in preparation due to the lack of foreign opposition but remained optimistic. “An international series would’ve made a big difference, but we tried to make the most of our camps,” she said. “We focused heavily on batting, as we often struggle with consistency. One or two players score, but the rest don’t contribute enough. If we can’t put up runs, it puts all the pressure on our bowlers.”
The team has trained across three different venues — Mirpur, Sylhet, and BKSP — which has helped them adapt to varying conditions, something they believe will be crucial in the World Cup.
According to chief selector Sajjad Ahmed Shipon, the matches played against the boys in Sylhet were of high quality. “The bowling from the boys was more challenging than many international women's bowlers. These games tested our batters thoroughly, and from a competitive standpoint, they were as good as international matches.”
Head coach Sarwar Imran echoed similar sentiments, highlighting the effectiveness of the conditioning camp in Cox’s Bazar and the upcoming tri-team tournament in BKSP, which will feature the BCB Red, BCB Green, and the boys’ Under-15 team in a round-robin format.
“We’ve done what we could. Ideally, we would’ve liked a foreign series, but these domestic matches and camps are helping us prepare the best we can,” said Imran.
While the team laments the absence of international fixtures, they aim to bridge the gap with rigorous domestic training and match simulations before embarking on their World Cup campaign.