Pakistan coach Mike Hesson slams Sher-e-Bangla surface as \u201cbelow international standard\u201d after team crumbles for just 110 runs in T20I against Bangladesh. Pakistan\u2019s crushing 7-wicket loss to Bangladesh in the first T20I has taken a controversial turn \u2014 not because of the scoreline, but due to the pitch at Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium in Mirpur. Head coach Mike Hesson didn\u2019t hold back, calling the surface \u201cnot suitable for international cricket\u201d after Pakistan were dismissed for only 110 runs, their lowest total against Bangladesh in T20Is. \u201cPlaying on such wickets won\u2019t help players grow \u2014 not ours, not theirs,\u201d Hesson said, warning that these conditions could hurt preparation for major tournaments like the Asia Cup. He also pointed out that Bangladesh Premier League (BPL) matches at the same venue feature better surfaces, questioning the logic of using substandard pitches in international play. Interestingly, Bangladesh captain Litton Das had echoed similar concerns just a day earlier, saying:\u201cMany players\u2019 careers have gone downhill playing here.\u201d As the series continues, the focus has shifted from the scoreboard to the soil \u2014 with growing calls to improve pitch quality for the future of competitive cricket.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Pakistan coach Mike Hesson slams Sher-e-Bangla surface as \u201cbelow international standard\u201d after team crumbles for just 110 runs in T20I against Bangladesh. Pakistan\u2019s crushing 7-wicket…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25942,"comment_status":"registered_only","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-25941","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25941"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25941\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/25942"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diplomacypakistan.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}