Cricket: Aucklanders set targets

By DAVE LEGGAT

Auckland will look to do New Zealand a favour by giving Bangladesh a grilling when they begin their four-day match at Eden Park today.

After rain effectively wiped out Bangladesh's opening game against a Districts XI at Wanganui last week, this represents an ideal chance for the tourists to prepare for the first test in Hamilton next week.

But if the fledgling test nation needs to get the most out of the match, Brooke Walker's team have a few statements of their own to make.

A New Zealand top three of Mark Richardson, Matt Horne and Lou Vincent has a strong appeal about it, after Mathew Sinclair's abrupt loss of form in Australia.

Richardson and Vincent are sure of first test places, and Horne already has one century behind him this season as he seeks a return to the international scene.

Allrounders Andre Adams and Kyle Mills have the one-day team in their sights, and Chris Drum knows, after his five-wicket haul on his brief return to the New Zealand team in Canberra this month, that the selectors have not forgotten him.

"We've talked about it as an opportunity to put your name in lights against an international team," said Walker, a legspinning allrounder, himself not a million miles away from the selectors' thoughts.

"But we won't be taking them lightly. It's a similar situation to when we played the West Indies a couple of years ago before their test series. We see it as our duty totry to knock them down."

Unlike many of his team-mates, Walker has played Bangladesh once before, in the old Conference Cricket days of the 1990s when he was at the New Zealand Academy.

He does not recall the names, but does remember "they didn't like the short stuff, so we'll be looking to be quite aggressive."

Bangladesh have had one setback, with promising fast bowler Masrafe bin-Mordaza out with a groin strain.

Mordaza, who has trained under former West Indian great Andy Roberts, is regarded as a sure bet for the test series, starting in Hamilton on Tuesday.

But one batsman worth watching is teenage Mohammad Ashraful. He arrives with the weight of history on his back. His 114 in his first test, against Sri Lanka in Colombo in September at age 17 years 63 days, made him the youngest test centurymaker - and youngest on debut - in test history.

While he is far from the finished product, he has shown enough to suggest he will be at the forefront of Bangladesh's battle to win acceptance from the tougher heads in the test arena in the years ahead.

Teams:

Auckland: Brooke Walker (capt), Matt Horne, Mark Richardson, Lou Vincent, Aaron Barnes, Kyle Mills, Nick Horsley, Reece Young, Andre Adams, Tama Canning, Mark Haslam, Chris Drum (one to be omitted).

Bangladesh (from): Khaled Mashud (capt), Hasibul Bashar, Javed Omar, Aminul Islam, Mohammad Ashraful, Al Sahariar, Emanul Haque, Hasibul Hossain, Manural Islam, Mohammad Sharif, Khaled Mahmud, Fahim Muntasir, Tushar Imran, Sanwar Hossain.