The Man of the Match Chigumbura
Zimbabwe upset Bangladesh
All credit must go to the Zimbabwe side who were regimented in their efforts, to systematically eke out a 38-run victory against Bangladesh in the tri-nation opener at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium in Mirpur yesterday.
But what of their opponents, the Tigers?
‘Simply terrible’ would be an apt way to describe them. It’s not so uncommon for a bottom-ranked side to win against higher-ranked opponents but the way Mohammad Ashraful’s men surrendered left numerous questions to be answered. It was hard for most to digest that the home side are now almost surely out of the running for the final. After yesterday’s result, beating Sri Lanka now seems an entirely unlikely prospect.
But why is it so upsetting?
Because inspite of everything, the fact remains that the opponents were not outstanding. It was a case of the home side’s performance bordering on the ridiculous that bothered everyone who had turned up or tuned in to watch the game.
There was no way that a 206-run winning target was a hard task considering this bowling attack of Zimbabwe and an otherwise good surface. But the home batsmen managed to bundle themselves out for 167, through a mixture of rash strokes and suicidal running between the wickets.
One can’t however expect much from a team whose captain has hardly any idea about what should be a leader’s role during crisis. There was required a calm effort from Mohammad Ashraful when he came to bat with the scoreboard on 10 for 2 but what transpired gave rise to the same old question: when will he learn from his mistakes?
Tamim Iqbal got off to a bright start by executing two boundaries in the very first over against Edward Rainsford but he walked back to the dressing room with an unfortunate run-out dismissal. Ashraful was the guilty party as he failed to notice that his partner was already half way down the pitch for a realistic second run. A perfect throw from long-on served to end the innings of the left-hander. But if that was unfortunate, what Ashraful did two balls later bordered on the criminal. The right-hander charged the Zimbabwe skipper and off-spinner Prosper Utseya to clear long-on but only managed to reach the hands of Sibanda.
The question was all around? How it was possible for a team captain to take such an attempt when there was a need to keep cool. Jamie Siddons’ desire to see his top order batsmen clicking in the match evaporated because none could apply their common sense in the chase of a moderate target. Shakib Al Hasan came up with some resistance but failed to bat through out the innings to rescue his side and that was the reason his 66-ball 52 went in vain.
If the batting of the Tigers was ridiculous then the explanation of Bangladesh captain behind the defeat was even more frustrating. "What I think is that there was pressure and we were dismissed because of this pressure of a ‘must win situation’," said the Bangladesh skipper in a post-match briefing. "Our batting was really poor and we conceded too many runs (20 runs) in the last over. We should have achieved this target. We had a bad day but now we have to look forward," he added.
Bangladesh captain however didn’t rule out his side’s chance to reach the final of the tournament. "What everybody expected was that we were going to win the match against Zimbabwe but it has not happened. So, you can’t say that it’s impossible for us to go to the final despite the fact that we have to win a match against tough opponents," he hoped.
Everyone was however surprised by Ashraful reaction when he was asked about his captaincy. "I’m not alone rather everybody played bad cricket in the match," he responded when asked whether he felt that the time has come to quit the captaincy. His counterpart Prosper Utseya pointed out the three run-outs and the dismissal of Shakib Al Hasan as the turning point of the match. "I think three run-outs made the difference and it could have been a different story if Shakib could have batted through the innings," said Utseya. But the young Zimbabwean skipper believes that the success came in their way because they followed the basic.
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