Uncertainty looms over Australia’s tour of Bangladesh, Tim Paine keeping fingers crossed

The fate of Australia’s tour of Bangladesh later this year is hanging by a thread due to the massive coronavirus outbreak across the world. The visiting team is scheduled to play a couple of matches in the World Test Championship (WTC) in Chattogram and Dhaka, starting June 11. Back in September 2019, the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) confirmed about the tour.

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit the WTC in a massive way after a number of series came to a halt. Tim Paine, the Aussie Test skipper, told that “you don’t have to be Einstein” to realise that their tour of Bangladesh is unlikely to take place in the current circumstances.

The BCB and Cricket Australia (CA) are yet to take a final call on the series. The final of the WTC is set to take place in June 2021, but the grave situation has put that under the clouds as well. Every other series has either been postponed or cancelled.

Tim Paine voices his opinion

The 35-year-old Paine has suggested to rearrange the schedule of those series, which had to be postponed, in a way that ensure the final take place as scheduled.

“I hope they don’t push it back too far for my sake, that’s for sure. Some series have been cancelled and whether ones going forward are going to be continually cancelled or we’re going to postpone them (is uncertain),” Paine was quoted as saying in cricket.com.au.

“Maybe the players are going to have to go through a period where we play quite a bit of cricket if we want to complete the Test Championship as it is,” he added.

In the WTC, the Aussies are placed second with 296 points from 10 matches. The series against Bangladesh would mean that they have the chance of going atop the points table. Paine and Co are currently 64 points shy of India’s tally of 360 points from nine games.

Paine will be 36 this December and he understands the fact that he doesn’t have much cricket left ahead of him. But he’s happy with the fact the Australian team has enough depth. Moreover, he has also backed Steve Smith to take up the leadership mantle yet again.