Bangladesh tour back on radar

Australia's first Test tour to Bangladesh in more than a decade could take place next year after the planned post-Ashes series in 2015 was postponed due to security concerns.

Cricket Australia Chief Executive James Sutherland has confirmed that CA has recently held "off-line" discussions with the Bangladesh Cricket Board and that the series has been pencilled into the international schedule for the 2017 southern hemisphere winter subject to security clearances.

Despite championing Bangladesh's rise to Test match status at the turn of the century, Australia has not played the Tigers in Test cricket since Ricky Ponting's team toured there in 2006, with only a handful of ODI matches played between the nations in Darwin (2008) and Dhaka (2011) since then.

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Australia was scheduled to play two Tests and a tour match in Dhaka and Chittagong last October, and had named a 15-man squad that included uncapped players Cameron Bancroft and Andrew Fekete along with recalled spinners Glenn Maxwell and Stephen O'Keefe.

But 48 hours before the squad was due to fly out, CA announced that departure had been delayed "due to concerns about the safety and security of the Australian Test team" based on advice received from the Australian Government's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

A week later, Sutherland announced that the tour had been postponed following information gleaned from DFAT, the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation and CA's internal head of security who was working closely with the BCB and Bangladesh authorities in Dhaka.

"We had hoped that the security concerns would fade, but unfortunately the advice we have received from the Australian Government and our own security experts has clearly indicated that there are now highly credible and unacceptable risks to our people should they make the trip," Sutherland said at the time.

"Further to this, an independent security assessment confirmed there is a risk of terrorism in Bangladesh targeting foreigners including Australian nationals."

CA subsequently decided to also withdraw the Australia men's team from the ICC Under-19 World Cup that was staged in Bangladesh earlier this year, with Australia the only Test-playing nation absent from the tournament that was won by the West Indies.

However, Sutherland has indicated that both nations are now eyeing an opportunity to reschedule the Test series in July or September next year, either side of Bangladesh's scheduled Test and ODI visit to Australia that is likely to be played in the nation's far-north.

"We've had discussions off-line with the Bangladesh Cricket Board," Sutherland said yesterday.

"They know and understand that we're absolutely committed to playing that (postponed) tour, obviously subject to security matters that we need to go through in preparation for that tour.

"But we're very much looking forward to getting back to Bangladesh and playing cricket over there."

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According to the ICC's Future Tours Program, Australia has a month free of international playing commitments immediately after the 2017 ICC Champions Trophy in the UK from June 1-18 next year, although Bangladesh are scheduled to host Tests and limited-overs fixtures against Pakistan at that time.

If the postponed Test series was rescheduled for September next year (when all Test nations have a break in the schedule that was originally to be filled by the now defunct Champions League), it means Australia could face two months on the subcontinent immediately prior to the 2017-18 Ashes summer.

Under the current FTP, Australia is scheduled to play an ODI series in India in October 2017 before England arrives down under for their Ashes defence.

But regardless of when the Bangladesh series is rescheduled during the 2017 winter, the Australian team faces a series of challenges in Asian conditions where history shows they have struggled to adapt over many decades.

Steve Smith's team departs for Sri Lanka in July for a series of three Tests, ODIs and T20 Internationals until September and then they return to the subcontinent in February next year for a likely four-Test series against India.

If, as Sutherland has indicated, the rescheduled Bangladesh series goes ahead next winter then the Australians will have played a majority of their Tests heading into the Ashes on spin-friendly Asian pitches.

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