Shocked Bangladesh cricketers returning home Saturday as Test called off after New Zealand shooting

The Christchurch Test was scheduled to start on Saturday morning but the Bangladesh cricket team are returning home later in the night on that day.

The match was called off after the players and staff of the team narrowly escaped death in shootings at two mosques that claimed at least 49 lives.on Friday.

Team Manager Khaled Mashud told the media that they will now leave New Zealand at 12pm local time and reach Dhaka at 10:40pm on Saturday. 

The shootings started just when the team’s bus arrived at Al Noor Mosque in Deans Ave, Christchurch where they wanted to offer their Friday prayers before practice.

The team bus was barely metres away from the scene of the carnage when the players first heard gunshots. Moments later they saw a woman collapse. Some of the players wanted to help the distressed woman, but just then they saw a horde of petrified worshippers pouring out of the mosque, some of them covered in blood.

"We couldn't react initially. In such a horror situation, your brain automatically freezes as you are terrified. That's exactly happened to all of us," Bangladesh cricket team's Performance Analyst Shrinivas Chandrasekaran, who was in the bus, told PTI over telephone from the team hotel in Christchurch.