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That brings us to the end of our coverage of the first ODI between South Africa and Bangladesh. The two teams meet again at Johannesburg on Sunday. This is I, Rajarshi and my co-commentator Pratyush, signing-off for tonight. See you soon!
Tamim Iqbal and Liton Das laid the perfect platform for the Bangladesh middle-order with a 95-run opening stand after the hosts won the toss and put them in to bat. Once both of them got out in the space of two overs, and Mushfiqur Rahim followed soon afterwards, it was the Shakib al Hasan and Yasir Ali Chowdhury show. The two of them knocked it around a rotated strike for about 5 overs before putting their foot down. Ngidi, Rabada, Jansen, all of the premium pacers of South Africa travelled around the park as Shakib and Yasir brought up a 100-run partnership in the 41st over. Yasir Ali proved to be a very, very clean and elegant striker of the cricket ball. The flick that he played from off-stump off Rabada for six deserves a viral reel or something equivalent, because that was one of the best cricket shots in recent times. Unfortunately, neither of the two could bat till the 50th over, as Shakib, trying to play one scoop too many, was trapped in front by Ngidi first, and then two balls later, Yasir went into his shot a bit too early and offered a return catch to Rabada. Bangladesh, though, finished really well. They got to 314 thanks to useful contributions from Mahmudullah, Afif Hossain, and Mehidy Hasan Miraz. The finish with the bat injected a lot of adrenaline among the Bangladesh pacers. While Shakib started off proceedings and tied things down from his end, Shoriful bowled with immense pace and made the ball whiz past the bat on several occasions, alongside extracting steep bounce. The left-arm pacer made inroads soon enough, getting Janneman Malan to nick one behind, and Mushfiqur took a fine catch. Verreynne was doing well by scoring at a run-a-ball and negating the threat the left-armer possessed, but then, Taskin Ahmed was introduced into the attack. He had the entire package in the opening spell; pace, bounce, movement, accuracy, all of which were enough to account for Verreynne and Aiden Markram in the same over. Temba Bavuma and Rassie van der Dussen then proceeded to progress with a rebuild of the innings. They were very methodical in their approach, seeing out the opening threats, playing themselves in, and then van der Dussen started to go on the attack. South Africa's chase came to a halt when Temba Bavuma was dismissed for 31, which brought David Miller to the crease. Van der Dussen survived a run out decision, courtesy a hastened decision from the third umpire. He was the aggressor until Miller got his eye in, and took a liking to Shakib and Mehidy's spin bowling. The required rate, though, kept on getting big on the South African batters, and to make things worse, van der Dussen got out just when it looked like we were in for a classic last-over finish. Miller kept on fighting as the lower-order struggled to get going, and in the end, it proved to be a bit too much. Mehidy kept chipping away with the wickets, and he ended up landing the decisive blow as well, deceiving Miller off the air and getting him out stumped. Three overs later, Bangladesh had their first-ever victory against South Africa in South Africa.
Tamim Iqbal, Bangladesh captain: It's a big win for us. It is a special win. All the team played, starting from Litton and myself, we gave a good foundation. Shakib and Yasir played unbelievably, I thought Yasir's innings was really special, the way he handled the South African fast bowlers and then, at the end, the small things as well. Those two sixes from Miraz, a six and a boundary from Afif and a quick 25 from Mahmudullah, I thought everything matters. It's a big thing that our fast bowlers are doing well for us. When you say Bangladesh, everyone thinks about spin. Not only in this game, I said during the toss that the the fast bowlers have been bowling brilliantly for the last two years. They are very young, they have a huge career ahead, and I'm sure they'll go from strength to strength, You need a character like Mehidy in every team. After going for runs, he came to me and said, "Give me the ball, I will change the game for you." It makes the captain's job easy when the players are so confident. It can go the other way sometimes, but I'm very happy with the confidence that he has, bowling in such pressure, short boundaries when the right-hander was there, picking up wickets, I think he was my man of the match as well. (On whether his team can win the series) Definitely. We just have to give ourselves every change. Today's gone, we can celebrate today, but we have to focus tomorrow. Different ground, South Africa are a quality side, and we know they will be eager to bounce back. We just have to make sure we play with a lot of heart and see what happens.
Shakib Al Hasan, Player Of The Match: When I spent 7-8 balls, I thought it was a good wicket. We needed to score somewhere around 300, so, we needed to keep the momentum going. Today, we started with Litton and Tamim, so it was important for us to keep the momentum as much as we could, because with the old ball, it was easy to score runs. That's what we tried to capitalize, and luckily today, it came off really well. I think Yasir batted really well, his and my partnership was important, so, a lot of credit goes to Yasir as well, young guy, playing his 3rd or 4th ODI match. (It might not have been easy for him playing) Against South Africa, in South Africa, but he played a really good innings for us. As soon as the shine was gone, I thought the ball wasn't doing much like the first 10 overs. We had to play through the line, take some calculative risks and it paid off today. I thought it was important to go after the bowlers from the 30th-40th over, otherwise we would have ended up with 260-270. The momentum that we got between overs 30-40 changed the game. We knew Rabada would bowl at the end, so we had to bring him back early, take some calculative risks. That was what we exactly did.
Temba Bavuma, South Africa captain: I think it's hard, when you consider getting 180 in the last 20 overs. They obviously had the momentum on their side going into the innings. I think there's a lot of conversations to be had to work with our bowling unit. We had that sense of control in the first 10-15 overs but we weren't able to get wickets. That's something we are going to have to speak about. In the middle, we pride ourselves on restricting the opposition and gets those dots going, but unfortunately today, we weren't able to do that. We generally know what we want to do in terms of a plan. We are quite good at adapting to what the conditions are asking of us, but we took a bit longer to do that today and we paid dearly for that. Had we been chasing a score around 270-280, those extra 40 runs proved to be the difference in the end. When you are chasing target of over 300, you need a batter to go on and score a hundred and you need the other guys to support them. Rassie and I were on target. My dismissal was an untimely one, and from then onwards we weren't really able to get good momentum. Apart from that partnership between Rassie and David, there wasn't much. With them in the middle, we had a shout but losing Rassie there really did make things difficult for us. Like I said with the bowling, we need to have some conversations with the batting as well. We expected the surface to skid on and it did. Probably a bit more variable than we thought with the back of the length. Their bowlers exploited that quite well and on the day, they were the better outfit. We don't have a choice. We're going to have to bounce back. We don't have a lot of time, Sunday is around the corner. Again, we will have to call upon the resilience that we are known for.
Bangladesh were in the driver's set right from the onset, thanks to a pace bowling display that will be a talking point for days. There was bounce, there was movement and there was pace all right, as South Africa were reduced to 42/3 in the powerplay. It was the duo of Temba Bavuma and Rassie van der Dussen who steadied the ship gradually, seeing out the new-ball threat. Van der Dussen started to find the fence more often as Bavuma gave him company. The Bangladesh bowlers, though, got in a few economical overs every now and then in the middle-overs to keep the required rate under check. Bavuma's wicket brought Bangladesh right back in the game, but it also brought in David Miller, who got his eye in and started smashing everything that came his way, releasing a lot of pressure from van der Dussen. Van der Dussen, who looked set to take his side home, picked out an athletic Yasir Ali at square leg 14 short of his hundred. From thereon, the task became more and more ominous as Miller ran out of partners, until he, too, fell in dramatic fashion, charging down and trying to connect with a ball that spun away from him. Soon afterwards, Keshav Maharaj was trapped in front, and Bangladesh achieved their first ever win against South Africa at the Rainbow Nation,
49.0
48.5 Mahmudullah to Keshav Maharaj, APPEAL FOR LBW! BANGLADESH HAVE MADE HISTORY! It was not given and Mahmudullah reviewed it straight away. You can see why, to be honest. It was fired in full and straight as Maharaj looked to take on the switch-hit again. Missed it completely as the ball thuds into pads. That's a stone-dead. UltraEdge confirms no bat involved. Ball tracking shows three reds. Maharaj falls, game over! Bangladesh win by 38 runs, and their limited supporters at the ground have been sent into absolute ecstasy!
Keshav Maharaj LBW b Mahmudullah 23 (16b 3x4 1x6)
48.4 Mahmudullah to Lungi Ngidi, DROPPED ANOTHER SITTER! A bit short around off, Ngidi rocks back to pull and finds the fielder but Afif's let this one drop out of his lap somehow
48.3 Mahmudullah to Lungi Ngidi, SIX! That is huge. Maharaj and Ngidi aren't going down without a fight. On length around middle stump,Ngidi hoicks it over the mid-wicket ropes for a massive six!
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SuperSport Park, Centurion
