Samuels And Narine Keep Series Alive

Samuels And Narine Keep Series Alive

Sunil Narine (far left) looked back to his best and decimated the Bangladesh top-order.

©WICB Media

West Indies 228-6 (Samuels 126) beat
Bangladesh 227 (Narine 4-37) by 4 wickets
Third One-Day International, Mirpur
Scorecard
Report by Daniel Grummitt

The series was Bangladesh’s for the taking before the third One-Day International in Mirpur began, but, thanks to Marlon Samuels and Sunil Narine, West Indies live to fight another day.

Narine finally found some of the magic that he had been missing on the tour so far and took four for 37 to help restrict the hosts to a modest total, while Samuels hit a century to help steady West Indies’ shaky run chase. 

The Bangladeshi spinners had again proved to be the tourists’ major problem as they were pegged back following an excellent second-wicket stand between Samuels and Kieran Powell. 126 for one quickly became 182 for five and suddenly the West Indies needed 34 from the last six overs with only the lower-order to keep Samuels company. Fortunately for them, Bangladesh captain Mushfiqur Rahim made what was, with hindsight, a huge tactical mistake and re-introduced the pace of Rubel Hossain for the 45th over. Samuels plundered him for 24 runs and the match was as good as won.

Samuels’ second-wicket stand of 111 with Powell - who was preferred to the out-of-form Lendl Simmons for this game - had allowed West Indies to recover from the early loss of their talisman Chris Gayle. However, Mahmudullah removed Powell for 47, while Abdur Razzak ended his 10 over spell with a brace of wickets. 

The match had begun well for Bangladesh as openers Tamim Iqbal and Anamul Haque put on 57 for the first-wicket. However, Tamim’s dismissal for 22 triggered a mini-collapse of four for 21 as Sunil Narine found his feet. He went through his full repertoire and, besides Tamim’s wicket, removed Haque for 33 and Naeem Islam for four, before returning to have Mashrafe Mortaza stumped.

His haul of four wickets set Bangladesh back and they never really recovered, in spite of the best efforts of Rahim (38) and Mahmudullah (52). They put on 58 for the sixth-wicket, while Sohag Gazi hit a late 30 off 36 balls to haul the home side up to 227.

Bangladesh would have fancied their chances of defending this against an unconfident West Indies batting line-up, especially after getting rid of Gayle early on, but Samuels again delivered the goods when it most mattered and kept his side in with a shout of winning the series despite their disastrous start.

© Cricket World 2012