Bangladesh's Mushfiqur Rahim gives up wicket-keeping in Tests

The 32-year-old wants to focus purely on batting in the longest form in an effort to lengthen his career across all formats

Mushfiqur Rahim has abandoned keeping wicket during the remainder of his Bangladesh Test career.

The 32-year-old wants to extend his career across all formats and concentrate fully on his batting.

The decision comes with Mushfiqur having taken the gloves in 55 of his 67 Test outings, during which he has accumulated 103 catches and 31 stumpings.

Central to Mushfiqur's decision is his increased presence in T20 franchise leagues across the world.

"I am not interested to keep wickets in Test," he explained.

"Now there are lots of games in the upcoming days and I play in all formats. Apart from international cricket, I play in DPL [Dhaka Premier League] and BPL [Bangladesh Premier League]. Considering everything, I think it is getting a bit overloaded," he said.

"I want to perform for a long time and because I am playing across formats I needed to think. I did not have any severe injury during the last five years but at the same time, I did not take a substantial amount of rest. In the future, such scenarios should not arise that I have to take rest in one or two series.

"So instead of that [missing series for rest] the only thing that I can do is minimise my workload and that is only possible by not keeping in Test and that's why I have taken this decision."

Liton Das could now be handed the responsibility of keeping wicket in the immediate future, starting with the upcoming Test series in India - the squad for which has not yet been confirmed.

With the bat, Mushfiqur has scored 4,029 runs at 34.73. He has six hundreds to his name including two double centuries against Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe.

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