Bangladesh stunned by Scotland
MUSCAT: Scotland stunned Bangladesh after a brilliant allround performance from Chris Greaves helped to secure a thrilling sixrun victory in a preliminary round match of the T20 World Cup, which began in Muscat yesterday.
Kyle Coetzer’s team recovered from a precarious 53 for six after a horror start and went on to post a competitive 140 for nine thanks largely to Greaves’ belligerent 45.
Greaves then returned to claim two for 19 and help restrict Bangladesh to 134 for seven in the seesaw contest.
Put into bat, Scotland was in trouble early after Mahedi Hasan, who took three for 19, and Shakib Al Hasan struck twice in the same over to wreck the top order.
Shakib also overtook Sri Lanka’s Lasith Malinga (107) as the leading wickettaker in T20 internationals in the process.
Greaves and Mark Watt, who made 22, lent respectability to Scotland’s total but Mustafizur Rahman claimed two wickets in two balls in the final over to restrict it to under the 150mark.
When it returned to defend the total, George Munsey took two catches to send back both the Bangladesh openers.
Mushfiqur Rahim hit spinner Michael Leask for backtoback sixes to ease the pressure but eventually threw away his wicket after making 38.
Skipper Mahmudullah made 23 but his team could get only 17 of the 24 runs it needed from the final over from Safyaan Sharif.
‘‘It was my day, I think, today,’’ Greaves said after collecting the player of the match award.
‘‘There’ll be many other days that any one of us in that squad could be a part of. I’m just so glad that I could contribute to what I did.’’
In the first group B match, cohost Oman thumped firsttime participant Papua New Guinea by 10 wickets, chasing down a modest victory target with 6.2 overs to spare.
Oman skipper Zeeshan Maqsood led by example, claiming four for 20 to restrict Papua New Guinea to a belowpar 129 for nine.
Skipper Assad Vala scored 56 and Charles Amini made 37 but the middle and lower order let Papua New Guinea down.
Omani openers Jatinder Singh (73) and Aqib Ilyas (50) killed off the contest smashing unbeaten halfcentries.
Singh sealed victory with the fourth sixth of his knock, sending an Amini longhop over midwicket.
The top two teams from this group will make the Super 12 stage from in the United Arab Emirates starting next Sunday. — Reuters