Rain played spoilsport for the fourth consecutive day of the solitary Test between Bangladesh and India
at Khan Shaheb Osman Ali Stadium in Fatullah yesterday as a draw seems to be the most likely result ahead of the fifth and final day’s play today.
The Fatullah Test, coinciding with the tropical monsoon, saw more than half of its allotted overs lost to rain. Near-perfect weather at the start of yesterday’s play proved to be nothing other than a false dawn with only 30.1 overs played in the penultimate day.
Bangladesh, in reply to India’s first innings tally of 462/6 declared, ended the day on 111/3 with opener Imrul Kayes remaining unbeaten on 59 while Shakib al Hasan was undefeated on nought.
Imrul, alongside Tamim Iqbal, made a promising start to the Tigers’ first innings. All the spotlight however, was on Tamim who began the day just six runs shy of Habibul Bashar’s record as the highest Bangladesh run-scorer in Tests. The Chittagong cricketer duly reached the milestone, surpassing Bashar’s tally in 10 fewer Tests, before departing for a 21-ball 19.
Imrul on the other end appeared steady and reached his third Test fifty with the help of 10 boundaries.
Mominul Haque, bidding to equal South African AB de Villiers’ record for the most number of consecutive Test fifties, struck successive fours off fast bowler Umesh Yadav but paid for playing one shot too many as he was dismissed for 30 having presented an easy caught-and-bowled opportunity to off-spinner Harbhajan Singh.
Tigers skipper Mushfiqur Rahim continued his poor run of form with the bat in the longer-version, scoring only two runs before becoming Ravichandran Ashwin’s second victim.