Tamim Iqbal became Bangladesh’s top run scorer in one-day cricket on Thursday as his team beat New Zealand by 40 runs in the second one-day international (ODI) to take an unassailable 2-0 lead in the three-match series.
Set a target of 248, New Zealand caved in for 207 in 46.4 overs to suffer their sixth successive ODI defeat to Bangladesh, who won Tuesday’s series opener by 43 runs.
Off-spinner Sohag Gazi and paceman Mashrafe Mortaza led Bangladesh’s bowling attack, sharing six wickets between them to stifle New Zealand.
Mashrafe made an early breakthrough when he bowled Hamish Rutherford for one before Sohag took a return catch to dismiss other opener Anton Devcich for 19.
The tourists were soon on 45-3, when Abdur Razzak trapped Grant Elliot leg before wicket for 14.
Corey Anderson (37) and Ross Taylor tried to repair the damage, but a stunning catch by Mushfiqur Rahim off Mashrafe ended their 61-run stand and gave Bangladesh a firm grip on the match.
Bangladesh sensed victory when occasional left-arm spinner Mominul Haque had New Zealand captain Brendon McCullum out leg before wicket for 14.
Taylor (45) held down one end before he was caught by Mahmudullah off Sohag at long on.
Some late blows by Nathan McCullum (25 off 23 balls) and unbeaten Kyle Mills (27 off 25 balls) only delayed the inevitable.
Earlier, Corey Anderson and James Neesham each grabbed four wickets as New Zealand bowled out Bangladesh for 247 on a slow Sher-e-Bangla pitch.
Anderson finished with 4-40, while Neesham claimed 4-53, his second successive four-wicket haul in the series.
Bangladesh also lost wickets at crucial times, even though most of their batsman got a decent start.
Tamim scored an arduous half-century, but was out when the team needed him to accelerate.
His 58 off 86 balls, which included five fours and a six, saw him overtake Shakib Al Hasan to become Bangladesh’s leading scorer in ODI cricket. Tamim, who has now 3,702 runs to his name in 124 ODIs, put on 63 with debutant Shamsur Rahman in the opening stand after Bangladesh captain Mushfiqur won the toss and elected to bat.
Shamsur managed only 25 before he fell to Nathan McCullum.
Bangladesh went into the batting power play in the 36th over on 149-3, but three wickets in three consecutive overs pegged them back.
Mominul Haque (31) and Mushfiqur (31) were the other notable scorers for Bangladesh.
The third match of the series will be played tomorrow.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier