Bangladesh registered a thrilling win over Zimbabwe in an intense encounter at the Gabba. Bangladesh, thanks to this narrow win, are now second in their group only behind India. The bangla tigers now have won 2 out of their 3 matches and have 4 points in their account so far. Zimbabwe on the other hand were handed a bitter loss and thus couldn’t continue their winning momentum which they had achieved after a famous win over Pakistan in their previous match. The team currently sits 4th in its group with 3 points in as many matches.
Bangladesh won the toss and elected to bat first at the Gabba. Zimbabwe had a perfect start as they got early breakthroughs to jolt the Bangladesh innings early on. After having lost two quick wickets inside the powerplay, Shanto and his skipper, Shakib Al Hasan stabilised the innings. The duo added crucial 54 runs for the 3rd wicket.
Shanto brought up a maiden half century in T20Is and brilliantly accelerated his innings thereon. With his departure for 71, Afif Hossain took matters into his own hand and scored a fine cameo of 29 runs off 20 balls. Bangladesh eventually finished at exactly 150 for the loss of 7 wickets in their 20 overs.
Zimbabwe had the worst possible start to their run chase of 151. The bowling duo of Taskin Ahmed and Mustafizur Rahman completely demolished the Zimbabwean top order in their opening spell. With four wickets down inside the powerplay, Sean Williams began rebuilding the innings for his side alongwith Regis Chakabva.
Taskin Ahmed uprooted Chakabva soon to send half of the Zimbabwean side back into the hut at 69. Williams however did not give in on pressure and continued his sublime stroked to keep his team’s hopes alive.
Some excellent batting from Williams who was assisted by Ryan Burl saw Zimbabwe bounce back into the game as the duo added a fantastic 63 off 44 balls for the 6th wicket. Williams brought up a magnificent half century under pressure as Zimbabwe started to strengthen their grip on the match.
However it was in the penultimate over of the game when things took an incredible turn with Shakib Al Hasan displaying excellence in the field to run a well set Williams’ out for 64. With 16 needed to win off the last over, Zimbabwe had given Bangladesh a tough time during the first four balls which included the dismissal of Evans followed by a four off a leg bye and a six from Richard Ngarva.
Mosaddek Hossain managed to hold his nerves as he picked two wickets in the final two deliveries to hand Bangladesh a narrow win. The last anti climax of the match however was yet to come when the umpires called the final delivery as a no ball due to wicket keeper – Nurul Hasan’s gloves being ahead of the stumps before he had collected the balls and stumped out Muzarabani off the last ball.
Mosaddek who had to re-bowl the last ball of the match now had 4 runs to defend which he did perfectly after he bowled a tossed up ball outside off which was missed by Muzarabani. Bangladesh eventually won by 3 runs to bag two crucial points.
The Shakib Al Hasan lead side registered a fine win and kept it’s hopes of reaching the semi finals alive. Their next game will be up against India on November 2. Zimbabwe meanwhile will take on Netherlands at Adelaide Oval.