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DHAKA, May 14, 2024 (BSS)- Gazi Ashraf Hossain Lipu, the chairman of the 
Bangladesh national team selection panel, urged all to tone down their 
expectation for the T20 World Cup, stating that the team has not yet reached 
a stage to set a bigger goal.

"We hope we'll overcome the hurdle of first round. If we can move to the 
second round, we will set our next goal," Ashraf, the former national captain 
who is popularly known as Lipu, said.

"In group phase, we'll play the team like South African and Sri Lanka. We can 
expect to win against Sri Lanka but Sri Lanka also knew that can beat us. So 
the two teams will be in pressure. And practically South Africa are miles 
ahead of us. We need to play extremely better than them or they need to play 
extremely poor if we want to win this game. The next two game against Nepal 
and Netherlands which we hope to win."

A few days ago, Captain Najmul Hossain Shanto also urged the fans to keep 
their expectation low. Ashraf believes Shanto wants to make it understand all 
that they would like to take it match by match rather expecting too much. 

"There is a huge craze for cricket in our country. Even when we didn't play 
at the big events, we saw packed stadium. I have been noticing it since 1997. 
That craze has now spread widely. Maybe the captain said it in that light. He 
wanted every to refrain from expecting too much," he said. 

"In T20 cricket, we haven't reached that stage yet where you can expect the 
team to reach in the semifinal. What he means is to go ahead step by step."

Bangladesh's best result came in the T20 World Cup in 2022 when they won two 
matches in Super 12 phase. They played well against India but eventually lost 
the game by 5 runs on DLS method.