Shawdesh Desk:

Bangladesh national cricket team’s strength and conditioning coach Mario Villavarayan said he was satisfied with the fitness of the players but was not completely happy as they began the condition camp ahead of Test against Afghanistan and tri-nation Twenty20 tournament.

Villavarayan, who conducted the opening day’s fitness training camp, however, defended their lack of fitness as the players were taking a test after eight months, a period when they were busy with almost non-stop international cricket.

‘We are doing a fitness test after eight months because we have been playing non-stop cricket since October. Again, for me and for the players it is to find out where they are and how we need to push them in the next coming months,’ he told reporters in Mirpur.

‘So in terms of where they are I am satisfied but not happy. So they need to improve… It’s natural that they are not at their best. But they are not bad. So I am happy in that sense,’ he added.

Apart from ace all-rounder Sakib al Hasan, batsman Sabbir Rahman and the High Performance team players, who are in a separate camp, the remaining cricketers of the 35-member preliminary squad joined the camp on the first day.

The HP cricketers – Yasir Ali, Nazmul Hossain, Saif Hasan, Mohammad Nayeem, Nayeem Hasan, Afif Hossain, Shahidul Islam, Shafiqul Islam, Yeasin Arafat, Aminul Islam Biplob,– are currently taking part in a three-match one-day series against their Sri Lankan counter-parts, which started on Sunday.

All the players successfully performed the first day’s activities along with the multi-stage fitness test, also known as beep test.

Pacer Abu Jayed, wicketkeeper-batsman Mushfiqur Rahim, all-rounder Farhad Reza and opener Jahurul Islam got the best result amongst the players in the beep test.

Villavarayan was highly impressed with Jahurul’s fitness with whom he worked for the first time and was also satisfied with Mahmudullah and Mohammad Saifuddin’s recovery.

‘The only guy who has not been with me before is Jahurul [Islam]. He did quite well. So it was good to see,’ he said.

‘Riyad [Mahmudullah] and Saifuddin completed what we needed them to do. They did quite satisfactory. But again as I said, we need to keep pushing them,’ he added.

Bangladesh one-day international skipper Mashrafee bin Murtaza didn’t take part in the beep Test and Villiavarayan said they would work with him later.

‘Well, we haven’t got any one-day cricket till next year. So there is no point in it. I don’t see a reason he [Mashrafee] should be doing a fitness test now when there is one-day cricket only in another six months’ time. So we will start working with him in the future,’ he said.

The Tigers have a busy scheduled in coming months as they are to play a one-off Test series against Afghanistan on September 5-9 and a tri-nation Twenty20 series against Afghanistan and Zimbabwe on September 13-24 before touring India in November.

Bangladesh’s new head coach Russell Domingo is scheduled to join the camp on Wednesday.