First test match starts at Lords today. Will the match last three days?
**England on guard against slip-up **](BBC SPORT | Cricket | England on guard against slip-up)
First Test, Lord’s: England v Bangladesh
England go into their first ever home Test against Bangladesh determined to avoid what captain Michael Vaughan sees as a “potential banana skin”.
With the Ashes series still two months away, Vaughan is keeping his team focused on this two-Test series.
“What’s important is that we play as we play every Test match, with the same intensity,” said Vaughan.
“We expect to beat them well but there is going to be a lot of hard work before we do that.”
With spinner Gareth Batty back in the side in place of the injured Ashley Giles, England have eight of the squad that won 2-0 in Bangladesh in 2003.
“In the first Test in Dhaka two years ago they gave us a bit of a fright so we know their enthusiasm levels will be very high,” said Vaughan.
Jon Lewis is the other member of the 13 to miss out, after Simon Jones recovered from back trouble. Ian Bell bats at four in his second Test, with Vaughan moving up a place.
While England are gunning for their fifth straight series win, the omens for Bangladesh do not look good.
No team has ever won its first Test at Lord’s, and the Tigers have won just one of 36 previous Tests.
But captain Habibul Bashar promised his team will go into the match with a fighting mentality.
“There’s no point going in thinking we can’t fight, we can’t play,” said the 34-Test veteran.
“Whenever we play, no matter who we play, we are always positive and we believe we can do something.”
Critics have predicted a swift end to the match, especially if the tourists bat first in tricky early conditions.
But coach Dav Whatmore insisted he will not rate his side on the result or even how long they manage to make the match last.
“The answer is not in the score line. It’s an objective review of the work of individuals,” he said.
“If enough of the players come through with a pass mark that is going to drag us from where we’re ranked now to somewhere above.”
Listed as 16 years and 267 days old, Mushfiqur Rahim will become the youngest ever Test debutant at Lord’s. Originally picked as the back-up wicket-keeper in the tour party, he has scored 196 runs so far on tour.
“It was terrific that he actually got into the 16 in the first place and then to force the selectors to pick him,” said Whatmore.
Spinner Mohammad Rafique is preferred to Enamul Haque and paceman Shahadat Hossain gains his first Test cap.
England team for first Test: A Strauss, M Trescothick, M Vaughan (capt), I Bell, G Thorpe, A Flintoff, G Jones (wkt), G Batty, M Hoggard, S Jones, S Harmison.
Bangladesh (from): Habibul Bashar (capt), Javed Omar, Nafis Iqbal, Mohammad Ashraful, Rajin Saleh, Mushfiqur Rahim, Aftab Ahmed, Khaled Mashud (wkt), Mohammad Rafique, Mashrafe bin Mortaza, Shahadat Hossain, Anwar Hossain.
you must be kidding, when was BD side “horse” at all?
