KEY POINTS:
As if the state of Bangladeshi cricket was not parlous enough, six prominent players are all but confirmed as having resigned to take up contracts with the Indian Cricket League.
New Zealand, due to arrive in Dhaka on September 30 for three ODIs and two tests against world cricket's poorest test-playing nation, are likely to face even weaker opposition than they might have expected.
The six - former captain Habibul Bashar, wicketkeeper Dhiman Ghosh, spinner Mosharraf Hossain, allrounder Farhad Reza and batsmen Aftab Ahmed and, most disappointingly, Shahriar Nafees - have cited unhappiness at the organisation of Bangladesh cricket.
The ICL, the privately run Twenty20 competition whose setting up inspired the Indian Premier League and set the world game on its head a year ago, claim to be in talks with 14 Bangladeshi players.
Deals worth US$200,000 ($307,000) for three years are in the pipeline, serious money in a country where top players earn about US$36,000 a year. A first-class player picks up around US$7300 a year.
Four of the six were in New Zealand last season when Bangladesh lost all three ODIs and both tests. Three of them - Reza, Ahmed and Nafees - provide the clearest reason why this shapes as a disaster for the game in Bangladesh.
All are 22, and while Reza and Ahmed are still finding their international feet, left-hander Nafees showed his talents with 138 against Australia - an attack of Lee, Clark, Gillespie, Warne and MacGill - in April 2006 at Fatullah, when the hosts gave the world's No 1 team a huge fright.
It's one thing to have 36-year-old has-beens like Bashar taking off; quite another to lose players with their best years to come. Aminul Islam, scorer of Bangladesh's first test hundred in their maiden test against India in 2000, put it succinctly yesterday.
"The authorities need to resolve this fast. It's like a virus which will infect the younger players," he said.
The pick of the Bangladesh players in New Zealand - openers Tamim Iqbal (19), Junaid Siddique (20), fast-medium Shahadat Hossain (22) and allrounder Shakib Al Hasan (21) - have not gone. Yet.
Captain Mohammad Ashraful, erratic, but capable of brilliance, is 24 and has reportedly turned down a US$500,000 offer to go the ICL way.
Bangladesh need time and must trust in their youth. If that youth is lured away, so the chances of improving any time soon on a test record of 47 losses and one win in 53 matches recede.
