Goalkeeper Aminul Haque will lead a relatively young side in absence of midfield stalwarts Arman Mia and captain Arif Khan Joy, who retired after Bangladesh's last international against Qatar.

The match will kick off at 3pm at the Army Stadium in Banani, the tiny venue hosting only its second international after staging an AFC Challenge Cup match last April.

Having lost all their matches so far, Bangladesh are eying on fielding a young team, mostly to give the under-23 players exposure ahead of the Asian Games and the Olympic football qualifiers.

Hasanuzzaman Babloo, who took over from Argentine coach Diego Cruciani in the middle of the ongoing qualifying competition, felt that although it would be a home match, the task for Bangladesh is daunting.

"Uzbekistan are one of the leading teams in Asia and would be hungry to win because of their position in the group," said Babloo.

The Uzbeks have so far won only one game, a 5-0 victory against Bangladesh in Tashkent on the opening day of the group. Tied with Hong Kong on five points at second place, the Central Asians lead on goal difference but must win to book a place in the finals.

"We have nothing to lose but our efforts would be to fight and better our performance than our previous matches against Qatar at home and abroad. A slender defeat to Uzbekistan would be appreciable but if we can hold them to a draw, it would be an achievement," said Babloo who would be happy to see rightback Hassan Al Mamun and attacking midfielder Mehdi Hassan Ujjal available for selection after recovering from injury.

"We have prepared for two weeks for this game but when we travelled to Uzbekistan after eight months' training, we conceded five goals. So, anything can happen.

"Uzbekistan are ahead of us in all departments and out target is to keep things tight at the back as well as play good football," said the former national winger, who prefers a three-man central defence compared to Cruciani's flat four backline.

Uzbekistan's Turkmenistan-born coach Valeri Nepomniatchi, who shot to fame in 1990 when he led Cameroon on an unlikely run to the quarterfinals at the World Cup with the Africans defeating defending champions Argentina, Romania and Colombia along the way, was worried about the weather.

"It's hot, almost 30 degrees here while at home, it was two to three," he said shortly after their arrival in Dhaka on Tuesday.

"We have to adopt to these conditions quickly," he said before his side rushed for an afternoon training session at the match venue. Whatever, I have confidence in our strong squad and we are here to win because we have no other way to qualify for the main event, said the coach whose side beat Latvian outfit Riga FC 2-0 in a preparation friendly at home on Saturday.

Nepomniatchi recalled Ilyas Zeytullaev to the side and hoped that the Serie A's Genoa midfielder can add some attacking verve to the squad to claim the other qualification spot for next year's finals -- which will be co-hosted by Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam -- behind runaway group leaders Qatar.

The former Juventus youth team player has not featured in any of their qualifiers and is one of three new faces in the squad apart from Mansur Saidov and 20-year-old keeper Aleksandr Lobanov.