Afghanistan won their first-ever one-day international series against Bangladesh, hammering the Tigers by 142 runs at the Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium in Chattogram yesterday with a match left to play. Afghanistan won the series thanks to centuries scored by Rahmanullah Gurbaz and Ibrahim Zadran, as well as a strong bowling performance.
The drama of the previous few days, which culminated with regular skipper Tamim Iqbal withdrawing his retirement, had snatched the attention from the series, and Bangladesh manufactured a poor effort in the second one-day international against Afghanistan, missing the motivation to resist a revived Afghanistan team. Bangladesh was defeated by Afghanistan by a score of 138 runs.
The Chattogram wicket was well suited for batting, but the captain, Liton Das, decided to bowl on it nevertheless. He may have been under the impression that the surface would become more conducive to batting later in the day, since the ball had come on to the bat much more cleanly in the second innings of the first one-day international.
The opening pair of Afghan players, Gurbaz and Zadran, played with the type of consistency and aggression under control that caused the Tigers’ strategies to be called into question right away. Gurbaz took the Tigers’ attack to the cleaners early on and reached his century in the 28th over of the game. Gurbaz was the early aggressor.
Before Gurbaz was out leg-before to Shakib Al Hasan after a 125-ball 145 that was packed with 13 fours and eight sixes, the duo stitched together 256 runs, which is Afghanistan’s best partnership for any wicket in one-day internationals.
Ebadot Hossain took out Rahmat Shah for Bangladesh, and then Mehedi Hasan Miraz scored two runs for Afghanistan. This gave Bangladesh a chance to compete with Afghanistan. Even Zadran was out before he could celebrate his century, as a string of wickets in the final overs saw Afghanistan reach 331 for nine in their allotted fifty overs.
During the first 30 overs of the game, Bangladesh was unable to exert any pressure on the Afghan openers, and the 33 extras that the hosts gave away demonstrated the lack of discipline in their bowling effort.
The strain of needing to score more than 300 runs caused Bangladesh’s chase to fall apart quite soon when they were at the crease. Fazalhaq Farooqi was successful in taking down Liton and Mohammad Naim, whereas Mujeeb Ur Rahman was successful in taking down Najmul Hossain Shanto.
Towhid Hridoy had difficulty picking the Afghan spinners before being bamboozled by a googly bowled by Rashid Khan, which resulted in his being run out for 16. After making eight deliveries, Shakib’s battle was over when he was knocked out leg-before by Mohammad Nabi with a score of 25. Afif Hossain soon followed suit and was out to Rashid for a duck off the first ball of the following over, which left Bangladesh in a precarious position at 72 for six.
During his doggedly fought 69, Mushfiqur Rahim demonstrated that there were no devils on the field. Because of a muscular ailment, Ebadot was unable to bat at Bangladesh’s final score of 189 for nine. He and Mehedi put up a seventh-wicket partnership for 87 runs with Mehedi (25), but they were unable to find any further partners.