Asia Cup T20: Bangladesh post convincing victory as UAE's chasing woes continue

Bangladesh resurrected their campaign with a comfortable win against UAE in Mirpur. Despite managing only a moderate total of 138, the Bangladeshi bowlers sealed the match with an impressive performance.

They were also aided by the atrocious display by UAE batsmen who could not back up the efforts of their bowlers as they collapsed to 82 all out in reply to the hosts’ 133/8.

Earlier, captain Amjad Javed won the toss and opted to bowl on a bowler-friendly pitch at the Shere Bangla Stadium. However, Bangladesh skipper Mashrafe Mortaza said that he would have batted first anyway.

The hosts replaced the under-fire Imrul Kayes with the inexperienced Nurul Hasan while UAE chose to leave out Qadeer Ahmed for another medium pacer in Fahad Tariq.

Bangladesh’s stuttering innings

The hosts got off to a flier in the powerplay with the opening duo of Soumya Sarkar and Mohammad Mithun taking full advantage of the fielding restrictions.

The UAE pacers were unable to get the initial breakthroughs as a result of inconsistent bowling.

When it seemed that Bangladesh were running away with the match, Sarkar played a poor shot and got out against the run of play. Sabbir Rahman who impressed in the opening match against India also found the going to be tough.

At the other end, Mithun continued to find the boundary to keep the scoreboard moving. Sabbir’s misery was ended by Rohan Mustafa, when he holed out attempting to clear the mid-wicket boundary.

UAE instigated a mini-collapse with some tight bowling to silence the raucous home crowd. Mithun ran himself out in an almost comical fashion and Mushfiqur Rahim followed suit to leave Bangladesh at 83/4.

Mahmudullah brought a sense of calmness to the proceedings by rotating the strike with ease. But, UAE continued to chip away at the other end by sustaining the pressure.

The final over yielded 17 vital runs as Bangladesh finished at 133/8. For the visitors, Mohammad Naveed was the pick of the bowlers with his nagging line and length.

UAE’s abysmal collapse

Taskin Ahmed and Al-Amin Hossain operated with the new-ball as the ‘Tigers’ looked for early wickets. In the very first over, Sarkar grassed a comfortable catch at slip to reprieve the dangerous Rohan Mustafa who rubbed salt into their wounds by smacking Taskin for a massive six.

There was further controversy in the next over when Mustafa was once again let off after Mustafizur Rahman‘s catch was deemed ineligible. However, the former did not learn from his mistakes and finally perished to a poor shot.

It turned into a procession thereafter as the UAE batsmen struggled to adapt to the pace variations of the Bangladesh seamers. Mustafizur Rahman picked up two in two to leave the opposition reeling at 34/5.

From then on, it was always going to be difficult as the fragile UAE batting lineup failed to apply themselves. But, it became even worse as a hit wicket and a terrible stumping summed up the chase which never got going.

Despite Muhammad Usman’s fighting cameo, UAE surrendered meekly to become the first team to be bowled out by Bangladesh in the second innings of a T20I.

Bangladesh play Sri Lanka on Sunday while UAE have another opportunity to redeem themselves against Pakistan on February 29.

Brief Scores: Bangladesh 133/8 (Mithun 47, Mahmudullah 36*, Naveed 2-12) beat UAE 82 (Muhammad Usman 30, Mahmudullah 2-5, Mustafizur Rahman 2-13 ) by 51 runs