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Bangladesh tour 'finalised': BCB

Host nation could host two Tests in August but Australia is yet to release tour itinerary

Cricket Australia are yet to confirm whether their planned tour of Bangladesh will go ahead later this year despite the head of the Bangladesh Cricket Board declaring a two-Test series has been "finalised".

BCB president Nazmul Hasan claimed on Friday that a two-match tour beginning in August had been agreed to with Cricket Australia, following a meeting with CA Chairman David Peever.

"(The) Australia series has been finalised," Hasan was quoted as saying to Bangladeshi media. 

"I am saying it because the president of their board told me on the last day of the meeting – Wednesday – that he and his wife are coming to watch the first Test. 

"That was the first time he said anything about the series during the meeting."

Peever was in Dubai along with his Bangladesh counterpart Hasan at an International Cricket Council board meeting during the week.

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But CA have insisted the details of proposed tour are still yet to be settled, with the governing body emphasising the security of players and support staff remains its number one priority.

"We are still hopeful of touring Bangladesh in the near future and are working closely with the BCB to look at options, but the safety of players and officials will always come first," a CA spokesperson said earlier this month.

"We will continue to monitor advice from ASIO, DFAT and our own security advisors about the security risk for any future tours of the Australian team in Bangladesh and make a decision based on this advice closer to any potential tour."

Australia had been slated to travel to Dhaka and Chittagong for two Tests in October 2015, but the trip was postponed after CA received security warnings from the Australian Government's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

They haven’t played a Test in the south-Asian nation in more than a decade, but did face them in a three-match one-day international series in Dhaka in 2011.

Image Id: 0723549D44BC43AC891D4B08827D720C Image Caption: Watson on his way to 185 in 2011 // Getty


Australia also refused to send a team to last year’s Under-19 World Cup in Dhaka because of security concerns.

CA’s anti-corruption and security manager Sean Carroll visited Bangladesh last October to monitor security arrangements as England toured the country for a month-long series. 

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England were given an unprecedented level of security and the tour passed without incident, prompting chief executive James Sutherland to declare in January he was confident Australia would return in 2017.

"I think they're quite high," Sutherland told the ABC of Australia’s chances of touring Bangladesh this year.

"What we saw at the end of last year was the England team tour Bangladesh and we saw very strong security around the team. We sent our head of security Sean Carroll over to observe for seven to 10 days, just to get a little bit of comfort on the systems and processes that are in place.

"I suppose anything can happen between now and then and we continue to monitor what happens in Bangladesh, but we work on the assumption that we're going to play and we start to plan accordingly.

"We certainly get a great deal of comfort from the way the security measures were put in place by the Bangladesh government in conjunction with the cricket board over there.

"At the moment, I would be assuming that we would be playing two Tests over there. They're tentative dates around August or September, I would think."

Should the tour go ahead, the matches would be Australia’s only Test series between now and next summer’s Ashes against England.

Australia also has a one-day international series in India penciled in for October though that tour is also yet to be confirmed.