Shakib stars as Bangladesh thrash Oman to stay afloat in T20 World Cup
MUSCAT, Oman (AFP) — Star all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan took three wickets and scored 42 as Bangladesh hammered hosts Oman by 26 runs yesterday to stay alive in the Twenty20 World Cup.
World number six Bangladesh came into the game in Muscat needing a win to stay in the hunt for the Super 12 stage.
They elected to bat and were bowled out for 153.
Left-hand opener Mohammad Naim, who smashed 64 off 50 balls, and Shakib set up the victory for Bangladesh with a key second-wicket stand of 80 after the Tigers lost two early wickets.
Mustafizur Rahman, who returned figures of 4-36, and Shakib then shared seven wickets to keep Oman to 127-9 as Bangladesh bounced back from their opening Group B loss to Scotland.
“We’ll take this win, but I think there are a lot of areas we need to improve,” skipper Mahmudullah Riyad said after the win.
“Shakib and Naim batted brilliantly, they had a good partnership and that took us to 150-plus. But we should have done better with the new ball. Bowled a lot of wides.”
Oman opener Jatinder Singh smashed 40 off 33 balls before falling to Shakib’s left-arm spin and it seemed the wicket deflated Oman.
Shakib struck with successive balls but Mohammad Nadeem prevented the hat-trick and went on to make 14 not out.
Mahedi Hasan was impressively economical with figures of 1-14 from his four overs of finger spin.
Oman fast bowlers Bilal Khan and Fayyaz Butt took three wickets each to peg back Bangladesh after the big partnership between Naim and Shakib.
Naim, who replaced Soumya Sarkar for the key match, survived two dropped catches on 18 and 26 to go on and raise his third T20 half-century.
The Oman bowlers kept picking up wickets and could have limited Bangladesh to a far lower score with better catching as Kashyap Prajapati dropped two chances and Jatinder spilled another.
“It is not acceptable the way we are fielding right now,” skipper Zeeshan Maqsood told reporters.
He added, “Oman is confident of a good show in the last game and a win will help us boost our cricket as we will meet the top nations and learn from them.”
