England 1 Bangladesh 1 - what a great Test series we've been treated to, with Bangladesh thoroughly deserving to come out of the series on a level pegging against England. The only regret of this series must be that we aren't fortunate enough to be able to witness a series decider, which it undoubtedly deserved.
Fingers will inevitably be pointed at England. To collapse from 100-0 to 164, no matter who the opposition, is very poor. But Bangladesh deserve all the credit in the world for their performance, with Mehedi Hasan looking like a real talent, backed up superbly by Shakib Al Hasan, who also looks the part with bat and ball (how many other players in the world open the bowling and bat at 5?).
Turning to their batting, Tamim Iqbal and Imrul Kayes also look like thoroughly good players - with Mahmudullah and captain Mushifqur also looking fairly handy. Their weakness, understandable considering the amount of test cricket that they play, is strength in depth, and this is the area which will be their un-doing against teams who play better cricket than England have done on this tour.
Having said this, their success during this series is a massive bonus for the future of Test Cricket, proving that the game is still as nailbiting as ever, and demonstrating that it's the format of the game that tests players abilities the most. It would be great to see more series such as this in future years, with perhaps the introduction of teams such as Afghanistan and Ireland another possible option that could enhance the longest form of the game.
As for England and their upcoming tour against India - they will undoubtedly need to improve on their performances in these two games, with both the bowling and batting lacking consistency. But do not underestimate the strength of this Bangladesh team in the conditions that England faced them in. Any team unfamiliar to these conditions would have found it a real test, and so it proved.
Team selection? For me, Ballance has to go. I don't think he did enough this year with Yorkshire to merit a call up in the first instance, and his performances here haven't bolstered his claims for a starting place in India. Before England's final innings of the tour, I would have gone for Hameed to open, with Duckett dropping down the order, but Ducketts impressive knock of 56 confuses this slightly. I'll leave that one down to the coaches and captain.
Bowling wise, I certainly would have taken Jack Leach on this tour and the India tour also, but that boat seems to have sailed, and so I'd probably have to stick with the same spinners used in this game, with Mo in particular looking like he might be gaining some more consistency with his bowling. Woakes has had his best year in the England team, and has to be included, whilst Finn will surely be replaced by Broad, if fit.
I hope that the India tour is just as entertaining as this one - and lets all hope that once again, Test Cricket will be the winner.
