David Hemp begins his two-year spell as Bangladesh women’s head coach with a searching assignment: a first-ever three-match ODI tour of Australia, one designed to test the side against the benchmark of world cricket. The 55-year-old will link up with the squad in Brisbane for matches at Allan Border Field on October 9, 11 and 14, with Australia entering the series as the No. 1-ranked team in both ODIs and T20Is.
Hemp’s contract runs until September 2028, and his return comes with Bangladesh seeking stability and progress after a turbulent few months. The former Bermuda international has already worked with the group as batting coach at the 2025 ICC Women’s ODI World Cup Qualifier in Pakistan and the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup Qualifier in Nepal earlier this year.
“I mean it’s always nice. I enjoyed my time here and obviously looking forward to this next stint,” Hemp told Cricbuzz. “Having worked with the girls previously, so I know what to expect, and that’s one of the reasons why I’m coming back because I enjoyed the environment.”
Bangladesh leaves for Australia on October 3, carrying the challenge of adapting to elite opposition and unfamiliar conditions. Hemp believes those demands can serve a broader purpose, giving his players an honest assessment of their current standing while exposing them to the standards required to compete with the leading nations.
Obviously, the Australia tour is a huge challenge,” Hemp said. “They’re the number one side in the world in women’s cricket, both in ODI cricket and T20. And they have individual players that are ranked highly within that, within the ICC system.”
Yet Hemp views the assignment as an opportunity rather than merely a daunting fixture. “You want to play against the best players because you want to be tested,” he said. “It’ll give us a really good indication of where we stand and also what we can pick up and what we can learn and how we can try and evolve ourselves to be able to challenge these teams at the top of the tree.”
The tour follows Bangladesh’s Asian Games campaign in Japan, where Nigar Sultana Joty’s tenure as T20I captain came to an end. Joty announced before the fourth edition of the Asian Games at Korogi Sports Park in Nisshin that she would step down from the role, and Bangladesh subsequently lost the bronze-medal playoff to Fatima Sana-led Pakistan by 31 runs on September 22.
Her decision arrived amid wider uncertainty around the team, including former head coach Sarowar Imran publicly raising concerns over its management. Hemp, however, made clear that his focus will be on creating alignment within the current group rather than revisiting issues from outside his time with the side.
“I don’t know what’s been going on,” Hemp said. “Any team needs to just focus on what we can control, and the most important thing for us as a group is to really connect and make sure that we’re all on the same page, all trying to move forward together.”
That message is central to Hemp’s early objective. He believes Bangladesh possess more ability than their ranking suggests, having seen encouraging signs of both quality and camaraderie during his previous stints with the squad. “My experience with the team has only been positive,” he said. “They played some really good cricket and seemed to have a good camaraderie and atmosphere together.”
For David Hemp, the immediate task is to turn those qualities into greater consistency. “We want to move up the rankings,” he said. “I don’t think [our current position] is really a true reflection of the quality that we have within the squad.”
(Quotes sourced from Cricbuzz)
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