Time will tell if Tamim makes a good captain

t's been mixed reactions, to say the least after Tamim Iqbal was appointed as the one-day international captain for Bangladesh on Sunday.

Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) president Nazmul Hassan had said that there would be a board meeting on March 8 and there the next captain of the ODI team would be announced then.

They kept their word and the left-handed opener, who scored 310 runs in the three-match ODI series against Zimbabwe and was joint man-of-the-series with Liton Das, was handed the duty of leading the team in ODIs. 

There has been a general consensus from certain fans that captaincy might once again affect Tamim's performance in the game because, in the last series where was captain of the team, he failed with the bat.

It was a three-match ODI series against Sri Lanka where Tamim had scores of 0, 19, and 2 in the three games respectively.

Former Bangladesh national team cricket player and captain Shafiq-ul-Haq though believed that the selection of Tamim as a captain for the ODI side was a good one: "BCB should be congratulated for their choice as Tamim is a man on form and is a senior cricketer."

However, his only concern was injuries and how often the 30-year-old has been injured in recent times: "Tamim needs to take care of himself and I know how hard he works in training so as long as he stays away from injuries, he should be fine."

Mahmudullah Riyad was a potential candidate for the ODI captaincy as he is already the twenty20 international (T20I) captain but Shafiq-ul-Haq was felt that, "Mahmudullah's batting was in decline and he hadn't been performing well with the bat in recent times".

The former national team captain had some advice for the ODI captain Tamim: "He should field at mid-on and mid-off to read the game better. And if required he can always take help from the other senior players."

With Shakib al Hasan banned from all forms of cricket for a year, Shafiq-ul-Haq was not sure if Tamim would be a long-term ODI captain: "Shakib and Tamim are great friends on and off the field and Shakib would be happy for Tamim and vise-versa if he was the long-term captain and led the team into the 2023 ODI World Cup."

The main worry still is whether Tamim can keep up his batting form and batting levels with the added burden of captaincy.

One of Tamim's best moments as captain came unofficially in the second Test against England at Mirpur in 2016 when Bangladesh won against the visitors.

Mushfiqur Rahim was the official captain but has things had gone sour between coach Chandika Hathurusinghe Mushfiq, Tamim was the man who took charge and led Bangladesh to their first ever Test win against England.

His first challenge will be against Pakistan in Karachi in the one-off ODI on April 1 and only time will tell how things pan out.