DHAKA: Bangladesh captain Mushfiqur Rahim and all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan hailed the South Asian team’s new-found aggression, believing that beaten Australia will have far more respect for them in the second and final Test at Chittagong next week.

As well as matching the skills of their opponents, Wednesday’s maiden Test win over Steve Smith’s men bore witness to a meaner streak among players keen to engage in verbal volleys with the tourists at the Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium.

Shakib led the way by giving Nathan Lyon a send off while Tamim Iqbal and others were involved in brief altercations with the Australians as Bangladesh staved off a late Pat Cummins assault to claim a thrilling 20-run victory.

“Australians are very good at it, we are learning from them,” Shakib, whose all-round brilliance with bat and ball earned him the man-of-the-match honours, said afterwards. “After this Test match, they will show a lot more respect.”

Shakib’s pre-series suggestion that Bangladesh could win both matches bemused many but also indicated the growing self-belief of a team who have registered their first Test victories over England and Sri Lanka in the last year.

“These wins will help us become confident,” Mush­fiqur said. “These experiences count a lot. When we face similar situations, we can handle them better.

“They [Australia] showed aggression but at the same time they also realised how aggressive Bangladesh can be, not only while playing but also in our body language.”

Mushfiqur claimed Australia’s predicament was evident when Glenn Maxwell indulged in a bit of time-wasting to avoid facing an extra over before lunch on Wednesday. The delaying tactic had little effect as he was dismissed immediately after the break.

“A team like Australia, who always try to dominate the opposition, were not willing to play an extra over before the break. That’s a big statement,” he said.

Former captain Habibul Bashar hailed the role of Shakib and opener Tamim, calling them role models for young cricketers in the country as both players celebrated their 50th Test appearances with strong performances.

“These two players are a class apart because of their ambition to be compared to the best players in the world,” Habibul told Daily Star newspaper. “Their hunger for success is unmatchable and they have developed a professional mindset which separates the current generation of cricketers from previous cricketers.”

Smith’s side arrived in Dhaka keen to get back to the cricket after an acrimonious 10-month standoff between the players’ union and Cricket Australia (CA) that reflected badly on both sides of the pay dispute.

Instead, the team’s hopes of quickly restoring some of the good will lost during the boardroom wrangling was swept away in the South Asian dust by an all-too-familiar string of batting collapses.

Australian media paid due credit to Bangladesh for engineering their first Test win over the tourists but were scathing of Smith’s team for failing to channel their superior resources into an expected victory.

“And then there are the prima donnas, otherwise known as the Australian Test team,” Jon Anderson fumed in Melbourne’s Herald Sun newspaper. “I use that term because these are the same players who went on strike over their pay packets, ones that dwarf most professional sportspersons in this country.

“So if you want to play that game, by heck you have to make sure you back it up in the field of play.”

The Australian said Smith’s men were ‘humiliated’ in an ‘inglorious outing’ by players earning far inferior salaries.

“The hapless 11 who became the first Australian team to lose a Test to Bangladesh will be paid an average of Aus$1.36 million from Cricket Australia this financial year, or about Aus$26,000 a week,” it said. “The team that humiliated them on a turning pitch are paid average salaries of just Aus$26,136, or about Aus$500 a week.”

Smith lamented that his team had failed to learn from mistakes made in India, where they lost 2-1 in February and March.

But the tourists seemed more culpable of looking too far ahead rather than focusing on the present in their approach to the much-improved Bangladesh side.

Before the series, Smith justified Ashton Agar’s selection in favour of fellow spinner Steve O’Keefe, who engineered the one victory in India, as taking a long view to beat the top-ranked Test side when Australia return there in four years.

Usman Khawaja earned a recall as Smith forecast ‘a big home summer’ for the stylish left-hander against Ashes foes England.

Agar took five wickets but it was a mediocre return on a pitch offering prodigious spin and bounce, while Khawaja managed a total of just two runs in two innings from the combined eight deliveries he faced.

Australia now face the more immediate problem of being 1-0 down in a series and the danger of falling to sixth in the world Test rankings if they lose the second match in Chittagong.

David Warner’s defiant second innings century broke his poor run of form on overseas pitches but few else of Smith’s batting team-mates can proceed with much confidence. There is no longer any disgrace in losing to Bangladesh, but there is some embarrassment when hubris has paved the way to defeat.

Published in Dawn, September 1st, 2017