The management of the New Zealand team arrived to play a two-Test series against the hosts with a decent understanding of what to anticipate, having toured Bangladesh twice in the previous three years.
In actuality, most teams travel to Bangladesh with the assumption that they will be greeted with slowness and lowness.
The green hue on the surface, something the Kiwis had assumed they wouldn’t see during their entire time in Bangladesh, caught them off guard on Thursday during their first training session in Sylhet.
The pitches were a touch greener than we had anticipated. Nevertheless, it spun,” the all-rounder from New Zealand, Glenn Philips, remarked during their workout.
During his three-minute encounter with the media, Philips, who previously visited Bangladesh in 2016 with the Under-19 squad, mentioned the extra grass on the practise pitches twice, looking plainly confused by it.
“They were a little bit greener than what we anticipated maybe encountering. Ultimately, though, we still have four days left until the first game [to] finish setting things up and getting ready,” he continued.
One of Bangladesh’s most athletic fields is the Sylhet International Cricket Stadium, where the first Test will take place.
Although the Black Caps have played 28 games against the Tigers in three different forms here, they are new to the country; this will be their first trip to Sylhet.
During their tour of Bangladesh, New Zealand has played 19 times against their hosts at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium in Mirpur, spending the bulk of their time in the nation’s capital.
New Zealand, like most cricket teams outside of Asia, had a difficult time playing at the Tigers’ “home of cricket,” Mirpur, which is infamous for its sluggish and low pitches.
With the aid of their army of finger spinners, the Tigers exploited this vulnerability and won two significant bilateral series victories over the Kiwis: the 3-2 Twenty20 series in 2021, which was their sole series victory over the Kiwis in the shortest format, and the 4-0 ‘Bangla Wash’ series in 2010.
The New Zealand team’s final bilateral match before the World Cup in India was a three-ODI visit of Bangladesh in September.
That series was contested at Miprur, with all three games played there, however the Tigers lost 2-0 overall, with one game yielding no outcome.
While the Tigers did not receive the much-needed boost from playing at their favourite hunting ground, it may have given them a hint of what was to come in the World Cup: eighth place, which included a convincing loss to the Netherlands, the only other associate nation competing.
The board chose to hold the first Test of the upcoming series in Sylhet, which is scheduled to be the first match for both teams in the current cycle of the ICC Test Championship, maybe as an attempt to make up for their previous error.
However, there is no assurance that the surface in the Sylhet Test would stay green like the practise wickets, given Bangladesh’s propensity to manipulate pitches to benefit their spinners.
The Kiwis would be in for another surprise, albeit a less pleasant one than the first.