Bangladesh hugely hurt their chances of progressing to the knockout stages of the World Twenty20 when they slumped to an embarrassing 73-run defeat against the West Indies on Tuesday. The hosts opened the Super 10 campaign in the worst possible manner with an exhibition of brainless batting, wayward bowling and horrible fielding. Openers Dwayne Smith smashed a quick-fire 72 off 43 balls while Chris Gayle made a run-a-ball 48 to power their side to 171 for 7. Chrismar Santokie and Samuel Badree shared seven wickets between them to skittle the Tigers for 98 in 19.1 overs and batter their net run rate which is at hopeless -3.65. The hosts got off to a horror start losing Tamim Iqbal (5) who threw his wicket away in the third over. The left-hander danced down the track and drove Badree hard and flat to give Dwayne Bravo first of his three catches—two of which were brilliant. In the next over, left-arm pacer Santokie struck twice in consecutive balls to stun the partisan crowd into silence. Bangladesh suffered a big blow when he deceived Anamul Haque (10) with another slower one that spun. The ball went past the outside edge and wicketkeeper Dinesh Ramdin whipped the bails off in a flash. Shakib Al Hasan went for a golden duck having failed to pick a Santokie slower and lost his off stump in the very next ball that gave the bowler chance for a hat-trick, which was denied by skipper Mushfiqur Rahim. Mushfiqur Rahim (22) and Mominul Haque (16) tried to rebuild the innings with the asking run-rate soaring. They added a 35 runs for the fifth wicket. After Mominul top-edged Sunil Narine under pressure to head back, Badree obliterated the hosts’ lower middle order. He took three wickets in one over to throw the hosts out of the game, taking out Sabbir Rahman (1), Mushfiqur (22) and Mahmudullah (1). His spell of 4 for 15 raised the spectre of Bangladesh being skittled below 78, their lowest total in the T20 Internationals. Any remaining chances for the Tigers were gone when the Bangladesh captain cut a short and wide one but failed to keep it low. Bravo flew to his right at backward point and took a stunning right-handed catch. Sabbir pulled the leg-spinner’s first ball straight to Darren Sammy at midwicket while Mahmudullah found a thick edge back to the keeper. Bangladesh added 39 more runs for the last three wickets of Ziaur Rahman (9), Mashrafe Mortaza (19), and Shohag Gazi (11). Mashrafe, before falling to Santokie, struck three fours as the hosts’ innings had only 10 fours. Andre Russell cleaned the tail with wickets of Ziaur and Gazi. After Bangladesh won the toss and put the defending champions in to bat, Smith and Gayle started off in a slow manner. The former went berserk in no time and got his 3rd T20I fifty. He provided the much needed momentum to the innings as Gayle was not able to time the ball and struggled his way to a run-a-ball 48. Smith, who smashed spinner Gazi for four boundaries in the 10th over that yielded 17 runs, slog-swept Mahmudullah but the ball ballooned off the top-edge to square leg where Al-Amin Hossain took it on the second attempt. Gayle perished in the first ball of the 19th over when he mistimed the loft to long off where Tamim took the catch. He paddled back, flicked the ball, went back and came inside the ropes to complete the catch. The Jamaican left-hander who was struggling broke free when he hit Shakib for a four and a six down the ground in the 17th over. A stunning final over from Al-Amin Hossain in which he took all his three wickets and gave away only four runs meant West Indies were restricted to the total after looking well set for more than 180. He had struggling Marlon Samuels (18) punch a slower one straight to the fielder at extra cover before getting Russell to sky one for a duck. The bowler sent back captain Bravo for a golden duck when Tamim flew to his right and plucked the thick edge from thin air at short third man. Sammy hit some fours to propel the target past the 170 mark as the West Indies lost three wickets for one run. Shakib struck with his first delivery to send Lendl Simmons for a duck with a flighted one heading down the leg. Simmons missed the clip and thought the ball had gone past the wicketkeeper and walked out of his ground. Mushfiqur whipped the bails off. – bdnews24.com
