Bangladesh bowlers once again proved why they are the team鈥檚 best bet to achieve anything in the ongoing 2024 T20 World Cup as they restricted South Africa to just 113-6 on Monday.
The New York pitch has been troubling batters from the onset of the tournament and the affair between the Tigers and the Proteas was expected to be a low-scoring one too.
However, that seemed to have changed when Quinton De Kock hit Tanzim Hasan Sakib for a six and a four in the first over.
The pacer, though, came roaring back, picking up three wickets, while Taskin Ahmed took another to reduce South Africa to 25-4 after the powerplay.
From there, though, Heinrich Klaasen and David Miller added 79 runs for the fifth wicket, which seemed like taking their score beyond 130, which would have been a brilliant score on a wicket that had variable bounce.
Bangladesh bowlers then turned it up again. Taskin came back and bowled Klaasen by bowling good length, and then Rishad Hossain, the 21-year-old leg-spinner, despite having a negative matchup against Miller, produced a brilliant top-spin to get rid of the left-hander.
In the end, the Bangladesh bowlers gave away just 13 runs in the final four overs, strangling the South African total under par.
The same thing happened in the game against Sri Lanka. Bangladesh kept picking up wickets and never let the Lankans get out of sight, and despite them being on 100-3 after 14 overs, they could just reach 124, and lost six more wickets, which was the doing of some brilliant bowling from the Bangladesh bowlers.
The Tigers suffered a big blow when Shoriful Islam injured his bowling hand during their warm-up game against India but Sakib has come in and not let them feel that absence, producing wickets.
Taskin has done well with the new ball and the old, Mustafizur Rahman has been great with his cutters 鈥� bowling 15 dot balls in his 24 on Monday 鈥� and while Shakib Al Hasan has looked off-colour, Rishad has taken charge, proving that he is worthy of his place. On top of that, they have Shoriful returning and Shak Mahedi Hasan on the bench.
The bowlers have kept Bangladesh in the World Cup so far. And they will need to do more to ensure that this campaign does not spiral out.
