DHAKA—Bangladesh oozed with confidence to seal the three-match T20 International and thereby end the Zimbabwe tour with a winning note as they take on the hosts tomorrow in the third and final T20 match at Harare Sports Club.
The match will start at 4.30 M as per Bangladesh Standard Time and will be aired live on Gazi TV and T Sports. With his match, Bangladesh’s month-long tour in Zimbabwe will come to an end.
Bangladesh so far won the one-off Test and whitewashed Zimbabwe in three-match ODI series. They also won the first T20 game before experiencing their first defeat in the series when Zimbabwe secured a 23-run victory in the second match.
A Zimbabwe victory effectively ended Bangladesh’s hope to win all matches in the tour but still there was a chance for Mahmudullah Riyad and co. to win the T20 series.
With the series locked at 1-1 now, the Tigers indeed want to claw back in style to not only confirm the series but also end the tour successfully.
Bangladesh T20 captain Mahmudullah Riyad said his side wants to look ahead, rectifying the mistakes that they made in the second match.
“One more match is left, which is like a final game for us. We will try our best to win that match,” Mahmudullah said ahead of the series ending match.
“It is tough to get back in a T20 match if you make any mistake. We made some mistakes in the last match and paid the price for it. We will try to rectify those mistakes and come out all guns blazing in the last match to seal the series.”
Bangladesh felt the absence of Liton Das and Mustafizur Rahman in the last match as the duo was in their best form. But their respective injuries kept them away from the game.
Mahmudullah said there is little chance that the duo could make way in the third T20 game.
“Liton has been in good form but unfortunately he sustained injury. Muatafizur bowled the last two overs in the first match through injury. We missed them in the second game but our combination was our best. We can still do well with this combination. It’s not that we will turn into a bad team after losing one game,” he opined.
Bangladesh and Zimbabwe so far contested in five T20 series, amongst which the Tigers won two series and the rest of the three series ended in a draw.
There is a chance for Zimbabwe now to end that drought. But Bangladesh wouldn’t like to squander the chance to beat Zimbabwe at their own den for the first time. Last time in 2013 in Zimbabwe, the two-match T20 series between the two sides ended in a 1-1 draw.
Bangladesh’s T20 record however didn’t speak a volume of them even though they have the upper-hand over the Southern African nation in this shortest format of cricket too.
The two teams so far faced off against each other 15 times and Bangladesh won 10 matches in contrast to experiencing defeat in 5 matches.
Overall Bangladesh played 101 T20 Internationals and won just 33. They had lost a staggering number of 66 matches while two matches fetched no result.
Bangladesh’s T20I squad: Mahmudullah Riyad (Captain), Tamim Iqbal, Naim Sheikh, Liton Kumar Das, Shakib Al Hasan, Soumya Sarker, Afif Hossain, Shamim Hossain Patwari, Nurul Hasan Sohan, Nasum Ahmed, Sheikh Mahedi Hasan, Aminul Islam Biplob, Mohammad Saifuddin, Mustafizur Rahman, Taskin Ahmed, Shoriful Islam.BSS