Bangladesh registered their first win in the Super 12 stage of the T20 World Cup, beating Netherlands by nine runs on Monday in Hobert.
Taskin Ahmed, the right-arm pacer, bagged four wickets for the Tigers to lead the way to the victory. Another right-arm pacer Hasan Mahmud also did well, taking two important wickets in this match.
Taskin ended up taking four for 25 – his best in T20Is now. His previous best was two for 12 against Papua New Guinea.
The Netherlands won the toss and opted to bowl first. Bangladesh posted 144 for eight.
In reply, the Netherlands lost two wickets in the very first two balls of their innings. Taskin’s pace looked too good for the Netherlands batters. The hard-working pacer provided Bangladesh with a dream start.
In the first ball, Yasir Ali took a tough catch at the first slip, and in the second ball, wicketkeeper Nurul Hasan took a regulation catch to dismiss the second wicket.
The Netherlands lost two more wickets trapped by run out in the fourth over when Shakib Al Hasan came to bowl and conceded a six off his first ball. Max ODowd hit him for a six off the first ball, but in the next ball, Max was trapped in run-out. In the same over, Bangladesh sent back Netherlands captain Tom Cooper as well who suffered a diamond duck- didn’t face any ball before getting run out.
Najmul Hossain Shanto saved a boundary in a great fashion and threw the ball to the wicketkeeper Nurul who broke the stump in a flash. And thus, Tom suffered the duck.
Colin Ackermann came up with a heroic knock for the Netherlands but it was not enough for them as he hardly got any support from his teammates who came a cropper today.
Scott Edwards and Ackermann had a 44-run stand in the fifth wicket, but that was not enough for them.
In the last over, the Netherlands needed 24 runs. Soumya Sarkar defended it conceding 14 runs with a six and a wicket off the last ball of the match. In the 19th over, Mustafizur Rahman conceded only eight runs and made the task tough for the Netherlands.
Eventually, the Netherlands ended up for 135 for all wickets in 20 overs, and Bangladesh sealed the match by 9 runs. They came close, but they needed to display more potent batting to win the match against a quality bowling attack.
Earlier, Bangladesh got a good start as the openers, Shanto and Soumya made a good start posting 43 in the opening stand. But the middle order failed to deliver well. Afif Hossain was the best batter for Bangladesh scoring 38 runs. Shanto posted the second highest of 25 runs.
At the lower order, Mosaddek Hossain scored 20 off 12 balls and helped Bangladesh to post a fighting total off 144 for eight.
For the Netherlands, Paul van Meekeren and Bas de Leede took two wickets each.
Bangladesh will take on South Africa on October 27 in Sydney.
