Sri Lankan skipper skipper Dimuth Karunaratne won the toss and elected to bat first in the first Test against host Bangladesh at the Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium in Chattogram on Sunday.
Ahead of the match Test captain of Bangladesh, Mominul Haque confirmed that left-handed all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan will play the first Test of the two-match series against Sri Lanka.
Mominul Haque also emphasised on dominating Sri Lanka for full five days in their bid to make a winning start to the two-match series, reports BSS.
Dominating the opponents for full five days is the thing that remains elusive for Bangladesh over the last two years, when they showed they had the credential to make them a force to reckon with in this format.
In the last two years, Bangladesh were in winning position for first four days in at least three Tests-one each against West Indies and Pakistan at home and one against South Africa recently on South African soil. But one bad session on fifth day cost them the game.
So, when they take on Sri Lanka for the first Test tomorrow (Sunday) at Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium in Chattogram, Mominul urged his side to be alert.
"What, we want to do, is to play well for full five days and dominate our opponents for full five days. This is what, is the most important task for us," he said at the press conference on Saturday.
"We are not thinking what they are planning. We are only thinking how we can bowl well and bat well for full five days."
Mostly the batting performance was the Bangladesh's weakest link in the South Africa series in which they failed to deal with the left-arm spinners, despite playing such sort of bowlers on home soil regularly.
And Sri Lanka is spin-heavy side, which posed another challenge for Bangladesh. But Mominul seemed to have unfazed by the challenge, saying that there is gulf of difference between South Africa and Bangladesh condition.
"We need to forget what happened in the past series. We have to solely focus on the current series. Again we have to remember that the condition of the last series was very different. We'll play a completely different condition now and this condition is known to us. Yes it is important to learn from the past mistakes. I think we learnt and we won't do the same mistakes," the Test skipper added.
One of the main causes of Bangladesh's batting failure in South Africa was Mushfiqur Rahim's off form. The veteran batter got out, trying to reverse sweep quite a couple of times in that series, sparking a huge criticism.
Critics said in the recent years, his penchant for reverse sweep cost Bangladesh many matches.
While Mominul said that reverse sweep is the strong aspect of Mushfiqur's batting, he said everyone needs to play their favourite shot when situation demands.
"It is important to understand the situation before playing any shot. The message was given everyone in the dressing room. I think everyone will learn from their mistakes."
Squads
Bangladesh
Tamim Iqbal, Mahmudul Hasan Joy, Najmul Hossain Shanto, Mominul Haque(c), Mushfiqur Rahim, Liton Das(w), Shakib Al Hasan, Nayeem Hasan, Taijul Islam, Khaled Ahmed and Shoriful Islam
Sri Lanka
Dimuth Karunaratne(c), Oshada Fernando, Kusal Mendis, Angelo Mathews, Dhananjaya de Silva, Dinesh Chandimal, Niroshan Dickwella(w), Ramesh Mendis, Asitha Fernando, Lasith Embuldeniya and Vishwa Fernando