Unhappy ending
When Mushfiqur Rahim headed for the presentation ceremony from the dressing room, with his head hanging low, early in the afternoon on the fourth day of the second and final Test against Pakistan, the little man looked like searching for answers to many questions after his side's 328-run defeat at Mirpur that not only gave the tourists their lone win on the tour but also the two-match Test series.
His deputy Tamim Iqbal summarised the outcome of the series in the best way when he said: "I think it's one of the best series we have played against a strong opposition, but it could have been fantastic had we at least showed some fight in the last match even if we lost it."
One good consolation for the Tigers was Mominul Haque's yet another half-century, his 11th in as many Tests, that made him the fifth player after Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Viv Richards and AB de Villiers to accomplish the feat.
However, ever since Mushfiqur invited his opponents to bat first to everybody's surprise, Pakistan never lost control
of the match as Bangladesh's batting missed the right application and, to some extent, the will against a very good bowling attack to suffer the heavy defeat with more than four sessions to spare after a creditable draw in the first Test in Khulna.
Pakistan, after being outclassed in the limited-overs leg and experiencing a surprise fightback in the Khulna Test, bounced back strongly to wrap up the Test series 1-0.
Pacer Imran Khan triggered the Bangladesh slide on the fourth morning as Tamim edged a wide full-length delivery to wicketkeeper Sarfraz Ahmed to miss the chance of overtaking Habibul Bashar as the highest run-getter for Bangladesh in this format of the game by seven runs.
Imran didn't have to wait too long for his second success as the right-arm paceman again found the edge, this time off Mahmudullah Riyad, who had actually passed hard time with the bouncers from Wahab Riaz during his shaky 12-ball innings.
Classy leg-spinner Yasir Shah, with his nice rhythm and variation, found bounce and turn to exploit the roughs on the pitch to finish with match figures of 4 for 73. Yasir effectively killed any hopes of a turnaround in the match the hosts had when he dismissed the Bangladesh captain after an ambitious Shakib Al Hasan miss-hit against Mohammad Hafeez landed at mid-off.
A technically sound Mushfiqur had a careful and cautious approach but he misjudged Yasir's leg-break to drag onto his stumps only to show that he was lacking in confidence after a few bad decisions in the match.
A flimsy resistance from Mominul and late blows from Shuvagata Hom were the highlights in Bangladesh innings after they had resumed the day on 63 for one.
A heavy defeat was written on the wall after Pakistan gained a 354-run first innings lead, but it was disappointing to see them give up the fight and lose six wickets for just 57 runs to sign off an otherwise memorable series.
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