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Ash turns another stone

Sports Reporter
Mohammad Ashraful will leave no stone unturned to become a consistent performer in international cricket.
The Bangladesh captain's focus is on how he would manage to stay in the wicket as much as possible. And to achieve the target he has been trying to take assistance from allcomers.
In addition to the 'team rules' and 'process' the right-hander himself completed a four-day meditation programme yesterday. And that was the reason he did not turn out at the Tigers' first practice session for the coming Asia Cup to begin in the last week of this month in Pakistan.
Pacer Shahadat Hossain could not attend the first-day's session
after losing his grandmother yesterday.
"This idea came from my elder brother and he has encouraged me to attend a four-day meditation programe conducted by Shahid Al Bukhari. I had almost ten hours sessions everyday," informed Ashraful.
"It may help me to concentrate more on my batting. Actually I have to wait till the next one or two assignments to see how it works. The Indian players regularly follow it and I hope it will also work for me. No doubt I have to work hard in practice and in the field but this kind of activities may also help," he added.
And the Tigers skipper will encourage his colleagues if he benefited from this.
It has already been proved that anything can happen in favour of the Tigers if the right-hander's bat speaks. But the problem is that nobody knows when he would
make a day memorable for Bangladesh because his 24.64 average in 42 Tests and 22.84 in 120 one-day internationals hardly reflect the potential.
Many eyebrows were raised after watching his recent batting approach -- 56 not out against Pakistan and 36 against India -- in the just concluded Kitply Cup but Ashraful found nothing wrong in his batting.
"I am really concerned about my inconsistency and I have to find a way to improve my average. I restricted my shots during the triseries and scored a few runs. I think we are in the right direction under our new coach (Jamie Siddons) and we just need time to get the result," explained Ashraful.
"What's wrong if this process makes me a better batsman than what 1 am now? One can't claim himself as a good batsman with
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such a poor average. But that doesn't mean I play for myself only, its rather for my team, " he added.
Ashraful also dismissed the notion that this kind of thinking ultimately kills his natural batting.
"I don't think so. Definitely I will play my natural game but before that I have to learn how to adjust my game and that is the reason I am trying all those things."
Bangladesh skipper expressed his optimism with the Asia Cup as he believes that his side has the ability to win a big match besides UAE. Sri Lanka are the other team in Bangladesh's group.
"This is not true that people are saving that a win is not our target. We are very positive in one-dayers
but what we believe is that if we can ensure improvement in all three departments we will win more matches."
He, however, said that they will need much better performance from the tri-series if they want to threat the giants.
"The performance in the tri-series was not at all frustrating but it was also not up to the mark. But I still believe that we have the ability to play much better."
Bangladesh team will fly for Pakistan on June 21.
The Tigers play their first Group A match against the UAE on June 24 and take on Sri Lanka on the following day at the Gaddafi Stadium in Lahore.