The Hindu : Sport / Cricket : No reason to celebrate: Ashraful

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Dec 20, 2004

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Sport - Cricket

No reason to celebrate: Ashraful

CHITTAGONG, DEC. 19. Md. Ashraful's natural instinct is aggression. Attack he did on Sunday, but with control.

"I used to think that I could get a hundred in every innings and so did the media and the public. I am mature enough now to realise that this is not possible," said the 20-year-old, speaking to the media after the third day's play.

Considering that defeat looms over his fantastic performance, Ashraful said, "I was a happier man at the tea break. All that vanished after the way we fared in the second innings. I am quite broken, mentally, after this. This can't be the moment to celebrate. I could not think that we would finish the day in the position we actually have."

He said expectations from him after he scored a century on debut had been unrealistic. It was evident that the right-hander had at no point bothered about the reputation of the Indian bowlers. "I was not thinking of who I was facing. It was not an easy pitch in the morning and I just concentrated on playing them on merit. I went after the bowling only when I thought I could. I resumed on 62 after lunch and the new ball was due in 18 overs. I wanted to complete my century before that."

Indian captain Sourav Ganguly hailed Ashraful's effort as "brilliant" and Bangladesh skipper Habibul Bashar described it as by far the best innings by a Bangladeshi that he has seen. "But we could not honour his innings," Bashar said.

Ashraful felt he had not used the advice he got from Sachin Tendulkar and Rahul Dravid during the series to the full. "Otherwise I would have done well in the second innings also. This failure hurts," he said. — Our Principal Correspondent

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