What Does the Sacking of Batting Coach Ashraful Mean for Shadman Islam After His 99 Not Out?

It means Shadman Islam ended the first day in Mirpur on 99 not out with an interim coach guiding the batters, because the BCB removed Mohammad Ashraful on 24 October, four days before the West Indies Test. Mohammad Salahuddin now runs the sessions and has said the credit for the innings belongs to Ashraful, who worked with the group for a year. The numbers show Shadman added two fifties but no hundreds in that time, and the board has still not explained the exit.

BCB Gives No Reason for the Exit

The BCB removed Ashraful on Saturday, 24 October, with cricket operations head Shahriar Nafees confirming the change. Ashraful was working with batters at the academy in Mirpur earlier that day when he was told, and the board announced the decision by evening. The West Indies tour consists of two Tests, so the new arrangement starts straight away. He had been appointed in November 2025 on a deal running to February 2027, so he leaves roughly a year early.

The board has not explained itself, but three recent setbacks stand out. Bangladesh failed to reach 200 in either group match of the UAE ODI tri-series and missed the final; they lost the one-off Test in Zimbabwe by an innings in June; and they went out of the Asian Games in Japan at the group stage. Ashraful remains employed by the board in a different position until his contract runs out.

Shadman Islam 99 Ashraful batting coach credit

Shadman finished the first day on 99 off 219 balls, the first time he has faced more than 200 deliveries in a Test innings, with Bangladesh on 213/3. Bad light stopped play with the hundred a single run away, and only 19 other batters have ended a Test day on 99 not out.

Salahuddin spoke after stumps and handed the credit to Ashraful, saying the batters had worked with him for the last year, that little needed changing in the short time since, and that any mental gain, large or small, deserves his name. He added that the dressing room badly wanted Shadman to get his hundred and that he should own more of them in Tests. He also praised the way Shadman read the conditions and avoided risky shots, and hopes the innings helps him in future.

A Test Record Without a Hundred

When Ashraful’s tenure began during the Ireland Test in November 2025, Shadman had 1,287 runs from 25 Tests at 28.60, with seven fifties and two hundreds, both against Zimbabwe in Harare, an unbeaten 115 in July 2021 and 120 in April 2025. His last century came in April 2025, months before the appointment.

By 9 October 2026 he had 1,565 runs from 31 Tests at 28.45, with two more fifties, the first against Ireland that month and 67 against Afghanistan the latest, and no new hundred. That is 278 runs added under Ashraful, and the unbeaten 99 is the closest he has come to ending the wait. His average barely moved over that stretch, from 28.60 to 28.45. Others did better: Bangladesh won five of eight Tests in that period, and Mushfiqur Rahim struck a national-record 14th Test century against Pakistan in a series where he made 253 runs.

Salahuddin Steps In as BCB Searches

Salahuddin, the BCB high-performance head coach, is interim batting coach for the two West Indies Tests only, and the board has not described the role as permanent. The BCB is talking to several foreign coaches, including a former Australian international whose name has not been confirmed, and it will decide only after the series ends. Ashraful, meanwhile, is being approached for a development role away from the national team.

The board wanted a foreign batting coach when it hired Ashraful in November 2025 and settled for him only after those efforts failed, so this exit looks like a return to the original plan. Until a permanent appointment arrives, the Shadman Islam 99 Ashraful batting coach credit question will follow every score Shadman posts, and it will be judged against a year of work that ended early.