Bangladesh, England cruise to easy victories in U19 World Cup

MUMBAI: Bangladesh rode on Tawhid Hridoy’s century and a fifer from Afif Hossain as they beat Canada by 66 runs for their second win of the ICC U-19 Cricket World Cup.

Sending Bangladesh in to bat first after winning the toss, Canada were off to a good start as they produced an early breakthrough, but Hridoy (122) put up a 63-run partnership with Mohammad Naim (47) before adding another 111 runs for the fourth wicket with Hossain (50) to steer their side to 264 for the loss of eight wickets.

The Canadians did start well, but kept losing wickets at regular intervals, with skipper Arslan Khan (63) running out of partners at the other end. Hossain was extremely impressive as he cleaned up the Canadian top-order to finish with figures of 5/43.

In the other match of the day, England thrashed Namibia by eight wickets as they chased down the paltry 197-run target with 155 balls remaining. William Jacks (73*) and Harry Brook (59) steered the ship for the England colts after the two openers — Savin Perera (26) and Tom Banton (21) — failed to convert their starts.

Earlier, Luke Hollman (3/41) led the charge for the English bowlers whose economical spells kept the opposition under a check right from the start. Besides Hollman, Tom Scriven (2/30) and Brook (2/32) picked up two wickets each. With the victories, Bangladesh now are on top of Group C with four points.