Backlash

Bangladesh today threatened to bounce back. This had England cowering in fright. But after Andrew Strauss read the Cricinfo article carefully, he recovered his composure. After the thrashing they received at the hands of West Indies, Bangladesh decided to take the day off and their mind off cricket and practiced relay racing. Don't believe me, Cricinfo tell us this.


Apparently, this was done to relieve the team of the pressure after their performance versus the Caribbeans. The team was too uptight after the hard work and were unhappy with the crowd's performance. Sinking to new lows creates pressure on teams to live up to pre-World cup hype of upsetting one established team.

I'm assuming that they consider being beaten by the West Indies as an upset. They are worried now about being upset by England and hence have decided to relieve some pressure and relax to play their natural game of losing every match they play.

What better way to improve your chances than to play no cricket at all? It appears that the novel strategy could be to play so poorly against England that the enormous crowds in Chittagong, Mirpur and Dhaka will have no expectations from their team. This will then relieve the team completely from all pressures.

For it's part, the ICC is taking care of the elite teams by ensuring that the next World Cup will feature no upsets.