Plenty to prove in rushed tri-series

This tri-nation tournament is not worth any hype: It's being contested by a weakened Sri Lankan side, a Bangladesh outfit that has only played against weak teams in the recent past and an Indian team which, though filled with attractive batsmen, is suffering from poor bowling form and abysmal fielding. And it's being played at the Sher-e-Bangla Stadium in Mirpur, a venue where dew is such an important factor that all the matches in the recent series between Bangladesh and Zimbabwe were won by the chasing team. The combination of these factors doesn't make for compelling competition but the timing, a year before the 2011 World Cup, gives the teams something to work towards and plug holes in their game.

Bangladesh
An almost inexhaustible supply of left-arm spinners, flashy batsmen prone to self destruct, no permanent set of seamers and 26 different opening combinations in five years has been the story of Bangladesh cricket. They've had mixed results in 2009: they beat Zimbabwe and a depleted West Indies but according to Jamie Siddons, the coach, it hasn't helped in determining the scale of their progress.

This series will help gauge how far they have come. According to Shakib-al-Hasan, a good fallout of playing teams like Zimbabwe and second string West Indies is that Bangladesh are learning how to win and getting used to it. What has been the stand-out feature of Bangladesh - and it's what offers hope for the future - is that unlike other teams in nascent stages, they don't have to wait for the bigger teams to have a really bad day to win; they can win on their own strength, by a collective burst of inspired performances. They go into this series with an inexperienced seam attack and yet again, will depend heavily on their spinners - Siddons has already said Abdur Razzaq will bowl in the Powerplays- and it's to be seen how their batsmen play.

One thing to watch out for: Tamim Iqbal has been speaking in recent times about focusing on facing more deliveries with the knowledge that runs will come if he stays at the crease. It's easier said than done for an impulsive stroke player but, as they say, you have made a start to solving the problem by admitting there is one and by acknowledging its solution. Will this be the series where Tamim grows up?

India
Two major areas of concern have emerged from recent series: wayward bowling and shoddy fielding. India's bowlers can be effective on helpful pitches but on flat surfaces, like the ones on which the World Cup will be won and lost, they have looked increasingly toothless. Nobody bowls yorkers. Nobody possesses a venomous bouncer. Nobody has a great slower one. They bowl with hope and not conviction on flat beds: Zaheer Khan might strike with the new ball, Ashish Nehra might be able to bowl tightly in the Powerplays, Harbhajan Singh hopefully won't fire it in flat on middle and leg stump. Ishant Sharma, once the next big thing, has been replaced by Sreesanth, who was also once the next big thing.

There are more hopes and mirages around the bend: Yuvraj Singh can make breakthroughs with his "easy action and that straight ball", Virender Sehwag can strike with his "natural drift", and who can forget what Sachin Tendulkar did a decade ago with the ball. And if all fails, there's Suresh Raina ("How intelligently he pauses sometimes before release; surely he can turn into a decent offbreak bowler"). And let's not waste time dwelling on India's fielding ("Poor outfields, you know, they didn't grow up diving" and that lovely gem: "It's about conservation of energy; why dive when you can kick it away").

One thing to watch out for though: During this series Virat Kohli could break away from the pack of contenders and cement his place in the ODI team. He has the game to do it but has he the mental fortitude?

Sri Lanka
Kumar Sangakkara had arrived as a messiah who would lead Sri Lanka into a brave new world but his honeymoon period was short and it's clearly over now. They said he wouldn't be as abrasive a leader and a freedom fighter as Arjuna Ranatunga was but he wouldn't be a passive as Mahela Jayawardene either. Sangakkara was supposed to be cool, confident, aggressive without being brash and tactically brilliant. Perhaps too much hope and pressure was piled on Sangakkara too early and perhaps it won't be too long before all those adjectives can be used to describe his leadership.

To be fair to him, Sangakkara did not inherit Jayawardene's settled side because Chaminda Vaas retired and Muralitharan is not the world beater that he was. Not all is rosy on the island: Sanath Jayasuriya, it seems, is being nudged and pushed towards retirement, Muralitharan's magic fingers and wrists are getting weary, Ajantha Mendis is getting used to reality devoid of any mystery (perhaps it might be the best thing that happened to him), Jayawardene keeps slipping into patches of bad form, Thilan Samaraweera hasn't fixed a spot in ODIs, Chamara Kapugedera has been finally dropped, Thilina Kandamby has improved but is yet to learn to finish games and there is a whole set of new seamers that seem to change every other series.

One thing to watch out for: Upul Tharanga showed signs of maturity in the series against India and, with the decline of Jayasuriya, his progress in the series will be a keenly-followed event.