Star-studded Fortune Barishal made an impressive start to their campaign, defeating one of the title contenders Rangpur Riders in their opening game of the Bangladesh Premier League in Mirpur’s Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium Saturday.
The match was the center of attraction for the fans as Barishal have the likes of Tamim Iqbal, Mushfiqur Rahim and Mahmudullah while Rangpur had national team skipper Shakib al Hasan and Tamim and Co eventually had the last laugh in the first round this season.
Barishal captain Tamim opted to field first and it was a dream start as pacer Mohammad Imran cleaned up Rangpur opener Brandon King in the very first ball of the game with an in-swinging delivery.
Seamer Khaled Ahmed then initiated a double strike on Rangpur as he took the wickets of opener Rony Talukdar (five) and Shakib (two).
Shakib chased a ball at off-stump and missed the line as it swung back slightly to castle his defense off the third delivery he faced - last ball of the second over - and the score was 15/3 at that stage.
Barishal bowlers maintained the pressure throughout the innings and kept up good line and length to restrict Rangpur for just 134 for nine in 20 overs.
Shamim Hossain scored 34 off 33 while Mahedi Hasan made 29 off 19 to take Rangpur’s tally past 130 mark but it proved to be well short of a competitive total.
Like his opening spell, player of the match Khaled also notched two wickets in the late stage of the innings and finished with figure of 4-0-31-4.
In reply, openers Tamim and Ibrahim Zadran started impressively particularly Tamim was on song from the very beginning as the veteran clubbed three boundaries in the first over.
Zadran (12) was the first to depart, against Shakib in the second ball of the fifth over.
Tamim played an entertaining knock of 35 off 24 with five fours and one six before getting out in the eighth over with the score 66.
Barishal lost a few wickets in the middle but their long batting order featuring Mushfiqur Rahim (26), Shoaib Malik (17*), Mahmudullah (19*) ensured they reached the target with five balls to spare.
3RD MATCH
Rangpur Riders 134/9 (Shamim 34, Khaled 4/31) lost to Fortune Barishal 138/5 in 19.1 overs (Tamim 35, Shakib 2/16) by 5 wickets
