The Asia Cup, that enjoys a rather exalted status as cricket’s one and only continental championship, returns Saturday for its 14th edition with an unmistakable sense of anticipation in the cricketing fraternity of Bangladesh.

Having experienced a hattrick of heartbreak as losing finalists in each of the last three editions, and being the only one of Asia’s four Test-playing nations yet to get their name on the trophy, perhaps no team at this year’s tournament has a bigger axe to grind in setting the record straight than the Tigers, reports the UNB.

To that end, Mashrafe bin Mortaza’s men must look to hit the ground running in Saturday’s tournament opener in swanky Dubai - one of two host venues for this year’s tournament in the UAE, alongside even swankier Abu Dhabi - against Sri Lanka, a team in transition but still packing enough firepower to overcome any opposition on their day.

Having expanded to 6 teams for the first time, this year’s Asia Cup will be the first to feature an initial round robin phase, during which they will be divided into two groups of three teams each.

The top two teams in each group will then progress to a ‘Super 4’ phase (when semi-finals may have been the more logical option), drawing on the Super 6 phase that has featured in recent editions of cricket’s World Cup, although not to be retained in England 2019.

Each team will carry forward points gained against their fellow advancers, and face off against opponents who came up through the other side of the draw, making for two more games for each side in the Super 4. After that the top 2 teams in the standings will progress to the final to be played on September 28.

The format makes the price of a bad day potentially very costly, while a good start off the blocks can prove invaluable to easing some of the pressure teams are under. Despite being placed in the slightly easier sounding (on paper) Group B with the Lankans and Afghanistan, Mashrafe must use his influence and leadership to stamp out any sign of complacency in the Tigers set-up.

Recent meetings against Sri Lanka may have seen Bangladesh in the ascendancy, but as 5-time winners of the Asia Cup to go with their memorable WOrld Cup triumph of 1996, the islanders’ pedigree is very real and despite some stalwarts recently departing, a slew of matchwinners fill their ranks.

Afghanistan on the other hand continue to progress in leaps and bounds, something the Tigers learned the hard way as recently as June, when a three-match series played on Indian soil (international cricket is yet to commence in war-torn Afghanistan, making the team’s emergence and progress even more remarkable) ended in a humiliating Pashtun-wash.

The only redeeming fact for Bangladesh in the wake of that series being that it was in their weakest format -T20I - and the Asia Cup is not. At least this year it’s not. The Asian Cricket Council has announced however that going forward, the tournament will alternate between the T20I and 50-over formats, in sync with the ICC’s schedule for the World Cup in each format. To date only the 2016 Asia Cup followed the T20I format.

Looking ahead to the tournament, Pakistan legend Zaheer Abbas, one of only three cricketers to have served as President of the ICC, has named Bangladesh as his pick with the best chance ‘to upset the apple-cart’, whereby either India (6-time Asian champions, including the inaugural T20I version in 2016) or Pakistan (3-time Asian champions) are heavily favoured to win again. 

‘There is also Sri Lanka who will be fancying their chances, but personally I believe that Bangladesh have the best chance to upset the applecart. They have a highly improved team and could do well in the event,’ Abbas said, in comments to Pakistani media.

Bangladesh arrived in the UAE largely untroubled in terms of injuries, although Shakib al Hasan, the country’s most accomplished cricketer, has been putting off an operation to his spinning finger.