Imrul guided Tigers
Imrul Kayes
||CF Correspondent||
Opener Imrul Kayes struck a brilliant hundred coupled by combined effort of the bowlers helped Bangladesh earn a 28-run win over Zimbabwe in the first one-day international of three-match series against the visitors in Dhaka on Sunday.
Imrul helped Bangladesh settled their nerves with his 144 off 140 balls, guiding the home side to 271-8 before bowlers restricted Zimbabwe to 243-9 after a shaky start in the first match at home in eight months, at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium. The match, however, will always be remembered for Imrul’s batting blasts which prevented Bangladesh from getting dismissed for an embarrassingly low score and killed the game as contest halfway through.
Opting to bat first after skipper Mashrafee bin Murtaza won the toss, Bangladesh found themselves in a tricky situation when three wickets fell for 66 runs in 15 overs before Imrul and Mohammad Mithun steadied the innings with a 71-run fourth wicket stand.
Both Imrul and Mithun (37) hit some sixes in tandem to put the pressure back on Zimbabwe but a moment of hesitation by the latter made things complicated again for the home side.
Mithun was hesitant to go for his shot or check it off a good length delivery of Kyle Jarvis and ended up poking a catch to Brendan Taylor without showing an iota of footwork.
Mahmudullah (zero) and Mehedi (one) followed him in quick succession as Bangladesh lost three wickets in the space of 16 balls to be reduced to 139-6 from 137-3.
Imrul and Saifuddin then shared a record 127-run seventh wicket stand to give Bangladesh a competitive score.
Saifuddin made 50 off 69 balls- his maiden half-century in his fourth ODI.
‘’ At the end of the day, the win is important. We lost too many wickets earlier and that put a lot of pressure. But Imrul batted professionally and our bowling was nice. Fizz had a bit of niggle in his elbow, hence couldn't use him much in this match,’’skipper Mashrafee said after the match.
Spinners Mehedi Hasan and Nazmul Islam shared five wickets between them as Bangladesh made regular strikes after a 48-run opening stand between Hamilton Masakadza (21) and Cephas Zhuwao (35) and gave Zimbabwe a glimmer of hope.
Mustafizur Rahman bowled Zhuwao for Bangladesh’s first breakthrough and the hosts did not look back with spinners taking the control of the game.
Sean Williams provided a late resistance with unbeaten half-century and 67-run stand with Kyle Jarvis but they were not enough to turn the tide for Zimbabwe.
Mahmudullah took an edge from Jarvis (37) just when the pair were getting dangerous as Mushfiqur Rahim completed the catch to end Zimbabwe’s ambition.
Mehedi returned with career best 3-46 and Nazmul returned with 2-38, also his career best.
‘’I thought we needed to finish off well and that (Saifuddin's) catch going down, was a bit of a turning point as that partnership was worth 120-odd. Jarvis did well today, the way he came back after that second over, also did well with the bat, that was good to see,’’ said Zimbabwean skipper Masakadza.
‘The way Sean batted was also really good to see. We won some blocks of the game but the way we lost the other blocks, it became difficult. I thought the wicket was very strange, it was unpredictable and spun a lot in the evening under lights,’’ he added.
