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SL is double trouble

BISHWAJIT ROY
It was still hard for Dav Whatmore to accept that his father was no more but being a true professional that he is, the Bangladesh coach was however determined to carry on with his life as a cricket coach.
"It is a very terrible situation for me because my father's presence was immense in my life. Even at the age of 91 he was strong enough to inspire me in everything that I did. Actually, we are a very close-knit family," said an emotion-choked Whatmore, who was Davellene Clifford's only son.
The Australian had to leave for Melbourne midway through the Tigers' tour of England to be at his ailing father's bedside, but the team's mentor received a small piece of consolation with the way his charges finished their demanding England tour.
Whatmore's father died on June 25.
The 51-year-old, who returned to Dhaka on Friday, told journalists at the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) Gulshan office yesterday he was preparing to concentrate on his next assignment -- September's tour of Sri Lanka.
"I had a long association with Sri
Lankan cricket. I have an intimate knowledge of how they like to play cricket and their approach towards the game. I will share my experience with the boys and I can only say that preparations will be as meticulous as possible," said Whatmore, who was the architect of the Sri Lanka's 1996 World Cup victory.
But he warned his players to be ready for a big challenge during their
25-day first full series in the islands.
"We have to be able to face two things; counter the swing bowling of Chaminda Vaas otherwise we'll have the same problems we faced against India's Irfan Pathan at home last December. And secondly, we have to handle champion off-
spinner Muttiah Muralitharan. We don't want to take other bowlers lightly but essentially their attack revolves around Vaas as Murali," he informed.
Whatmore didn't rule out one or two upsets during the three-match one-day and two-match Test series.
"Yes, we are here to do that but one thing is for sure Sri Lanka will be careful against Bangladesh after the glorious victory against Australia. But we also have an advantage that we're going to play in familiar conditions," he said.
Sharing his thoughts on the England tour, which saw the Tigers lose both Tests in two days, Whatmore felt that overall it was a worthwhile experience.
"It was a very tough tour but in the end we finished on a positive note. The objective in any tour is to improve along the way. This was a very important winning curve for Bangladesh," he said.
The Bangladesh coach was not ready to blame anybody for their poor showing in the Test series rather he pointed to playing cricket in early summer conditions and no luck with the coin as causes for the debacle.
"If you look at the other countries who toured there they had to tour three to four times before they had pulled off a victory. In our case we showed improvement on our first tour although it came in the shorter-version of the game. I think it could have been nice if we had played the Test series later and had bit of luck with coin tossing," he explained.
According to Whatmore the teenage pair of Mohammad Ashraful and Aftab Ahmed deserved plenty of praise for showing courage under fire at different times in the two-month tour.
"We have learned again how good a player Ashraful is. There was clear evidence that this boy can be very good in future. His hundred against Australia at Cardiff was a very natural innings. In fact, a few other innings he played was an indication that he is turning the corner, in other words the consistency looks like coming in him," said Whatmore.
"The problem is Ashraful and Aftab have all the shots in their arsenal that's why sometimes their innings ended too early. Look at Javed (Omar) he has limited shots that's why he tried to play within his limitation. It is easy to criticise two young players for their excessive shot-making but what we want from both Ashraful and Aftab is for them to understand their game," he said.
On the other hand, Whatmore aired on the side of caution while talking about left-handed opener Shahriar Nafees.
"It is nice to see some options in the opening spot but it would be unwise of us to say that Bangladesh had discovered a left-handed toporder batsman. But I was impressed with his comments in Friday's press conference in which he said that he would try his best to cement his place in the national side," he added.