The Bangladesh men's national cricket team (Bengali: বাংলাদেশ জাতীয় ক্রিকেট দল), commonly known as The Tigers, is the national cricket team of Bangladesh, administered by the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB). They are a Full Member of the International Cricket Council (ICC) with Test, One-Day International (ODI) and Twenty20 International (T20I) status.
They became an associate member of the ICC in 1977. Bangladesh's first official foray into international cricket came in the 1979 ICC Trophy in England. On 31 March 1986, Bangladesh played their first ODI match, against Pakistan in the Asia Cup. For a long time, football was the most popular sport in Bangladesh, but cricket gradually became very popular – particularly in urban areas – and by the late 1990s, it had surpassed football in popularity. Bangladesh performed inconsistently until 1997, when they marked their first major victory, winning the 1997 ICC Trophy in Malaysia and thus qualified for their first Cricket World Cup, in England in 1999. There, they defeated Pakistan – causing much upset – and Scotland. This set the way to becoming the 10thTest-playing nation. On 26 June 2000, Bangladesh was granted full ICC membership. They played their first Test match in November 2000 against India, losing by 9 wickets in Dhaka.
