In this article, we preview Bangladesh vs West Indies, the third match of an ODI series in Chattogram in the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup Super League on the West Indies tour of Bangladesh. West Indies have chosen to field a largely inexperienced team after covid-related fear caused several experienced players to opt out of the tour.
Match Preview: What to Expect
In the first ODI in Dhaka on 20 January, Bangladesh won the toss and elected to field in overcast conditions. Sunil Ambris and Joshua Da Silva opened the innings for the visitors. In the second over of the innings, Mustafizur Rahman had Sunil Ambris out LBW for 7 to leave West Indies at 9 for 1. A regular fall of wickets further on saw the score slip to 56/5, with Rahman claiming his second scalp in Joshua Da Silva. Shakib Al Hasan, making his come back to ODI cricket after a year-long gap, got the wickets of Andre McCarthy, Jason Mohammad and Nkrumah Bonner. Then followed the best part of the innings from the West Indies’ perspective: a 59-run stand between Kyle Mayers and Rovman Powell. At 115 for 5 after 29 overs, the visitors briefly threatened to post a challenging score with both batsmen striking the ball well.
However, that dream was shattered in the 30th over, when newcomer Hasan Mahmud who bowled with lively pace and bounce had Powell caught behind for 28 and trapped Raymon Reifer LBW on the next ball. Alzarri Joseph averted the hat trick but could only watch helplessly from the non-strikers’ end as wickets fell in a heap. Raymon Reifer and Akeal Hosein lost theirs to Hasan Mahmud while Kyle Mayers who made a top score of 40 gave his to Mehidy Hasan Miraz. Shakib returned to the attack to polish off the innings at 122 all out and bowled out Joseph to finish with figures of 4 wickets for 8 runs in 7.2 overs. West Indies lost their last five wickets for the addition of only 7 runs.
Bangladesh chased down the target with relative ease in 33.5 overs while losing the wickets of Liton Das, Tamim Iqbal, Najmul Hossain Shanto and Shakib Al Hasan in the process. Skipper Tamim Iqbal made a top score of 44 off 69 balls with 7 fours. Akeal Hosein gave the visitors a positive take away from the game, finishing with figures of 3/26 from 10 overs, while skipper Jason Mohammad took the only other wicket to fall.
Summaryp>In the first ODI, Bangladesh improved their head-to-head comparison with the Caribbeans to 16-21 in 39 matches between the sides. Nobody expected a new-look West Indies side with six debutants to beat Bangladesh, but the West Indies camp will do well to find out what went wrong after they slipped from the relative comfort of 115/5 to be 122 all out. The visitors will have to punch above their weight to be able to compete against the far more experienced Bangladesh side.