Mehedi played like 'a king': Sammy

It's not often that you get to see two players from a single team arrive for the post-match press conference after a Bangladesh Premier League game. However, it's also not that often that you see a team win a game after getting reduced to 43 for seven.

The Rajshahi Kings did exactly that yesterday. They overcame a mountain to beat the Rangpur Riders and their skipper Darren Sammy was so excited that he tagged along the player-of-the-match, Mehedi Hasan Miraz to the post-match presser. The youngster scored an unbeaten 41 coming in at number eight and then scalped two wickets with the ball in his hands.

According to Sammy, Mehedi played like a king.

“We all know what he is capable of doing. We needed two kings to stand up today and one of them was the youngest player of the team and the other was the vice captain.

“In the previous game it was me and a couple of games before that it was Samit Patel. When you start believing as a unit, there is more belief and you are more focused and you know someone is going to give it out there for the team,” said Sammy.

Mehedi himself was delighted to have finally posted a good knock with the bat. Considered as an all-rounder from a very young age, Mehedi didn't do justice to his batting talent during the recent England series. He didn't do too well at the start of the BPL either and therefore his knock yesterday was a relief.

“Batsmen just have one chance and it's difficult for them. There is a lot of pressure on them in this format. I like to play long knocks and take my time. And I got that opportunity today. I took my time and played my own game,” said Mehedi.

“Obviously this knock has given me a lot of confidence. There was a lot of pressure on us to come back in the game. But then again, confidence won't always remain. It will be there one day, it will go the other, so I need to remain focused,” he added.

One of the highlights of Mehedi's innings came in the last over of the first match when he went down the track and smashed Rubel Hossain for a six over the bowler's head. It was something that the youngster enjoyed a lot.

“Many people think that I can't hit sixes, but that shot just proved that I can. I try to hit big shots. But in general I always like to take singles. The big hits come only after I get settled,” explained Mehedi, next to an excited Sammy who was jokingly nodding his head as though he understood every word that the youngster was saying in Bengali.