MUSCAT: Bangladesh overcame sloppy fielding and erratic bowling to beat T20 World Cup co-hosts Oman by 26 runs on Tuesday and keep their hopes alive of advancing to the main round.

Opening batter Mohammad Naim, who replaced Soumya Sarkar, reached 64 and Shakib Al Hasan scored 42 off 29 balls before Bangladesh were bowled out for 153 off the last ball at the Al-Amerat Cricket Ground.

Mustafizur Rahman bowled five wide balls in his first over and also dropped one of the two early catches before bagging 4-36 as Bangladesh got their act together in the latter half of the innings and restricted Oman to 127-9.

“Well take this win, but I think there are a lot of areas we need to improve,” a relieved Bangladesh captain Mahmudullah said. “Shakib and Naim batted brilliantly ... but we should have done better with the new ball, bowled a lot of wides. We need to see those areas and correct them.”

Oman had a sniff until opener Jatinder Singh (40) was at the crease, but once Shakib (3-28) had him caught in the deep and off-spinner Mahedi Hasan bowled an economical spell of 1-14, the home side capitulated.

Earlier, after losing the toss, Oman also had a below-par performance in the field with Naim twice getting dropped. Shakib and Naim both shared 80-run third wicket stand but Bangladesh lost eight wickets for 52 runs once careless Shakib got run out in the 14th over.

Fast bowlers Bilal Khan grabbed 3-18 and Fayyaz Butt, who took a spectacular diving catch off his own bowling to dismiss Mahedi for 0 early on, took 3-30.

“It was quite a chaseable target,” said Oman skipper Zeeshan Maqsood. “But we couldn’t our fans happy. We have to see where we went wrong, come back and crack that.”

Scoreboard

BANGLADESH:

M. Naim c Ayaan b Kaleemullah 64

Liton Das lbw b Bilal 6

Mahedi Hasan c and b Fayyaz 0

Shakib Al Hasan run out 42

Nurul Hasan c Goud b Zeeshan 3

Afif Hossain c Jatinder b Kaleemullah 1

Mahmudullah b Bilal 17

Mushfiqur Rahim c Naseem b Fayyaz 6

M. Saifuddin c Jatinder b Fayyaz 0

Taskin Ahmed not out 1

Mustafizur Rahman c Zeeshan b Bilal 2

EXTRAS (B-2, LB-5, W-4) 11

TOTAL (all out, 20 overs) 153

FALL OF WKTS: 1-11, 2-21, 3-101, 4-112, 5-120, 6-122, 7-138, 8-138, 9-151.

BOWLING: Bilal Khan 4-0-18-3; Kaleemullah 4-0-30-2; Fayyaz Butt 4-0-30-3; Mohammad Nadeem 4-0-35-0; Aaqib Ilyas 2-0-16-0; Zeeshan Maqsood 2-0-17-1.

OMAN:

Aaqib Ilyas lbw b Mustafizur 6

Jatinder Singh c Liton b Shakib 40

K.H. Prajapati c Nurul b Mustafizur 21

Zeeshan Maqsood c Mustafizur b Mahedi 12

Ayyan Khan c Mahmudullah b Shakib 9

S. Goud c Mushfiqur b Saifuddin 4

Naseem Khushi c Mahmudullah b Shakib 4

Kaleemullah c Nurul b Mustafizur 5

Mohammad Nadeem not out 14

Fayyaz Butt c Mushfiqur b Mustafizur 0

Bilal Khan not out 0

EXTRAS (LB-2, W-10) 12

TOTAL (for nine wkts, 20 overs) 127

FALL OF WKTS: 1-13, 2-47, 3-81, 4-90, 5-101, 6-105, 7-105, 8-112, 9-112.

BOWLING: Taskin Ahmed 4-0-31-0 (2w); Mustafizur Rahman 4-0-36-4 (8w); Mohammad Saifuddin 4-0-16-1; Shakib Al Hasan 4-0-28-3, Mahedi Hasan 4-0-14-1.

RESULT: Bangladesh won by 26 runs.

UMPIRES: Ahsan Raza (Pakistan) and C.B. Gaffaney (New Zealand).

TV UMPIRE: H.D.P.K. Dharmasena (Sri Lanka).

MATCH REFEREE: R.S. Madugalle (Sri Lanka).

PLAYER-OF-THE-MATCH: Shakib Al Hasan (Bangladesh).

Published in Dawn, October 21st, 2021