|| CF Correspondent ||

Bangladesh captain Mashrafe Bin Mortaza won the toss for the first time in the ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 and opted to bowl first against England in their third match of the tournament at the Cardiff on Saturday.

The fielded an unchanged side which beat South Africa by 21 runs before losing to New Zealand narrowly by two wickets.

“This pitch has been under cover for the last two days. We liked to but we are sticking with the same team. Last match was disappointing but hopefully we will bounce back. We have to play at our best to beat this England team,” said Bangladesh captain Mashrafe Bin Mortaza.

England made one change, bringing in fast bowler Liam Plunkett in the place of Moeen Ali. The hosts, considered as red-hot favourite to win the World Cup also beat South Africa in tournament opener by 104 runs.

They however fell short of 14 runs against Pakistan while chasing 349 runs target.

Statistically England are far ahead than Bangladesh, winning 16 matches, in contrast of losing four matches in their 20 encounters. But Bangladesh held the advantage when it comes to ICC Cricket World Cup.

Both team encountered each other thrice in the cricket’s biggest extravaganza and England just won a match in 2007 by four wickets. Bangladesh then defeated England by two wickets in 2011 and by 15 runs in 2015 World Cup, inspired by a deadly spell of Rubel Hossain. By virtue of this victory Bangladesh also made the World Cup quarterfinal for the first time.

The magnitude of that defeat at the hands of Bangladesh was such that England brought wholesale changes to the white-ball cricket method which paid rich dividends, making them the most destructive side who now possessed the two highest score of ODI cricket—481 and 444.

Bangladesh however have never been beaten in Cardiff. They stunned the then all conquering Australia here by five wickets in 2005, to establish them a force to reckon with and later they beat New Zealand here also by five wickets, recovering from a shaky 33-4 to chase 266 runs successfully and romped to the ICC Champions Trophy semifinal in 2017.

Line Ups:

Bangladesh: Tamim Iqbal, Soumya Sarkar, Shakib Al Hasan, Mushfiqur Rahim (wicket-keeper), Mohammad Mithun, Mhamudullah Riyad, Mosaddek Hossain Saikat, Mehidy Hasan, Mohammad Saifuddin, Mashrafe Bin Mortaza (captain), Mustafizur Rahman.