Litton's form 'not a concern' for Hathurusingha

Bangladesh head coach Chandika Hathurusingha was unfazed by the form of Litton Das who of late has been going through a bad patch.

Litton, unarguably one of the best batters of the country, given his last three year's form, had a poor outing in the Global T20 tournament in Canada and the Lanka Premier League (LPL).

He scored 152 runs in nine innings with just a fifty under his belt in Canada before making just 34 runs in three innings in LPL. 

As he would have to take full responsibility to give Bangladesh a good start in absence of Tamim Iqbal, his form raised a question ahead of the Asia Cup.

But Hathurusingha was reluctant to judge Liton's form by T20 matches as the Asia Cup will be an ODI-format tournament.

"I have no concern about his form at the moment because he has played in a few competitions in Canada and in Sri Lanka. Those are T20s," Hathurusingha said here today.

"But he's training really hard. If you look at those recent tournaments that he played, the pitches are not that great, not high scoring, especially in Canada. And to a certain extent in Sri Lanka. So, whatever the runs he scored were impact runs. Yes, we want him to play a different role, like a big role during the Asia Cup and the World Cup. So, I hope that he will show," he added.

The main thing which kept Bangladesh fans concerned is that Litton on most occasions failed to prolong his innings despite getting a good start.

Bangladesh head coach however expected Litton to hit form in time when it would matter most.

"He thinks that he could have done much better. So, we also think that he's capable of doing more than what he's showing us. So, definitely, he will show us the form that he had for the last two years when he was the highest run scorer. We are expecting that kind of performance from him," Hathurusingha said, showing his confidence toward Litton.

Rather than Litton's form, Hathurusingha looked more concerned about the absence of fast bowler Ebadot Hossain, who was ruled out due to injury.

Terming Ebadot as the impact bowler, he said: "Ebadot is one of our impact bowlers, the fastest bowler out of the five fast bowlers we played in the last few series. So, it's a big loss, and to replace him straight away it's a hard task. Hopefully, he'll recover soon."