It was another horrendous display of batting and fielding from the home side as defending champions West Indies crushed Bangladesh by 73 runs to register their first win in the World Twenty20 Super 10 yesterday.
Apart from the toss nothing really belonged to Mushfiqur Rahim and his team as the Caribbeans were helped by a 97-run opening partnership, between Dwayne Smith and Chris Gayle, and the Tigers’ “butter fingers” to put on a commanding 171 for seven wickets.
Minus the two stunning catches from Tamim Iqbal, Bangladesh exhibited an ordinary fielding effort which not only cost them at least 20 runs, but also handed the momentum to West Indies half way through the match who otherwise would have looked shaky with something around 140-150 on the scorecard.
Bangladesh needed a crisp start that would lay the platform for a positive result, but a triple blow in six deliveries faded any chance the hosts had in the game. Anamul Haque started off in his usual brisk manner hammering two fours off Samuel Badree from the mid-off region while Tamim also struck a blistering shot over point to show glimpse of a good start.
However, Badree had Tamim caught in the third over before left-arm pacer Krishmar Santokie baffled Anamul and Shakib al Hasan. Dinesh Ramdin did a fine job standing up as Anamul dragged his feet out after completely making a hash out of Santokie’s slower while the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium was stunned and speechless after Shakib was handed a golden duck on the day after his 27th birthday.
From 16 for three, Mushfiq and Mominul Haque added 35 in their rebuilding process and the flood gates opened once the partnership was broken by world’s No 1 T20 bowler Sunil Narine. Badree who returned to pick off Mushfiq, Sabbir Rahman and Mahmudullah (both for one) to leave the home side reeling at 59 for seven in 11 overs.
The threat of getting bowled out below their lowest T20 total of 78 was overcome by the lower order before the formalities were completed in the last over with Sohag Gazi cleaned up as Santokie’s third victim of the night and Bangladesh were all out for 98.
Earlier, the bowling combination of Mashrafe bin Mortaza, Al Amin and Gazi did well to restrict the dangerous opening pair to 36 runs in the powerplay but all hell broke loose with man-of-the match Smith firing on all cylinders.
Smith opened up and took his last 38 runs from just 13 balls hammering the spinners all over the park. He was eventually caught by Mahmudullah for 73 off just 43 balls while Gayle on the other end played another uncharacteristic innings of a run-a-ball 48.
There was no real contribution for the other Caribbeans as only Marlon Samuels (18) and Darren Sammy (14) reached double figures. Sammy however was dropped twice in two balls at long-off by Mahmudullah in the 19th over before Al Amin bagged three wickets in the penultimate over to put a stop to the leak.