In the last youth World Cup held in Bangladesh the country's youth team achieved their best result by reaching the semifinals and finishing third, but Bangladesh Under-19 will face stiff odds when they attempt to replicate that run by winning tomorrow's ICC Under-19 World Cup quarterfinal against their mighty Indian counterparts in Queenstown, Otago.
The match will get underway at 3:30 am Bangladesh time and there is scant reason for the young Tigers to be confident ahead of the knockout clash in alien conditions.
While the young Tigers have been efficient in brushing aside unfancied Group C opponents Namibia and Canada by 87 and 66 runs respectively, their batting has not withstood the sterner test against England as they were all out for 175 and lost the match by seven wickets. Pinak Ghosh, Afif Hossain, skipper Saif Hasan and Towhid Ridoy, who hit a century against Canada, are the main batting hopes but it is doubtful whether they can ace the pace test of India's Shivam Mavi and Kamlesh Nagarkoti.
India, meanwhile, hold a 13-2 advantage in head-to-head contests against Bangladesh. Prithvi Shaw's team have also completely bossed their opponents on way to finishing Group B champions, with the narrowest margin of victory being 100 runs against Australia in their opening match. They brushed aside both Zimbabwe and Papua New Guinea by 10 wickets, with 170 and 252 balls remaining respectively.
Moving past the current tournament, the wider history of youth cricket also favours India greatly. Along with Australia, they have the most titles with three and were also the runners up in the 2016 edition in Bangladesh.
There are really only two stats that Bangladesh can draw comfort from -- they won the most recent meeting between the two teams in the U-19 Asia Cup in Malaysia last November, and their other victory, coincidentally, came in their only other meeting with India in New Zealand, in Auckland during the 2002 edition. However, there are caveats there too -- only four of the current Indian team were not present during the loss in Malaysia and the 2002 match was played between two completely different sets of players.
