MATCH STORY
Follow UsBangladesh’s Nahid Rana, 21 years old and 6 foot 3 inches tall, playing only his third Test, did not have the best of records (match figures of 1/135 in the first Test and an overall bowling average of 58.33) behind his back when he was handed the ball in the 17th over of Pakistan’s second innings on Day 4 of the second Test at Rawalpindi.
The hosts were already three down, but two of their most dependable batters in Babar Azam and Shan Masood were at the crease. However, Nahid decided to make it his day as some of his teammates had already done on the tour.
Nahid’s nasty short balls
Nahid first got the wicket of Pakistan skipper Shan Masood. The ball was short of a good length and moving away from him. The left-hander slashed hard and got a nick to the keeper. A wicket in the first over pumped up the right-arm pacer. He continuously kept his length on the shorter side of the ‘good length’ area and reaped rewards. More important than length was his speed. In the very same over in which he got Masood, Nahid eked an edge out of new man Saud Shakeel too, but it fell short of first slip.
The ball on which he forced Babar Azam to have fish at a ball going harmlessly in the keeper’s glove was bowled at a speed of 141 kilometres per hour (kmph). Had it been 10 kmph slower, Babar might have been able to get a thicker edge and the ball might have flown over gully.
Not getting disheartened
The 21-year-old then bowled a bit slower and on the very next ball managed to get a nick out of new man Mohammad Rizwan’s bat. However, Shadman Islam in the slips dropped a sitter. Not getting disheartened by the drop catch, Nahid continued to hit troubling lengths and got one to edge Shakeel’s bat from 'round the wicket.
It was three wickets in three overs for the speedster. The speed of the delivery that got Shakeel out was 146 kmph. Yes, Nahid beat the batter with the highest Test average in Pakistan playing XI with speed. The Nawabganj born was as lethal a weapon as Bangladesh would have desired, as he soon got Salman Agha to nick one that fell just short of the gully fielder.
As if he had not already terrorised the Pakistan batters in the first spell of seven overs, Nahid, in his second spell, got an edge out of Rizwan that fell short of backward point.
Magic from Mahmud
While Nahid was already causing problems, Pakistan had found decent momentum on their side as Agha and Rizwan added 54 in quick time for the seventh wicket. But as the lead was nearing 150, Bangladesh skipper Najmul Hossain Shanto brought Hasan Mahmud into the attack. Again, it was a pacer playing only his third Test, but, unlike Nahid, Mahmud had been successful in the first Test. Plus he had already claimed two wickets in the second innings.
The 24-year-old, who had got Abdullah Shafique with an outswinger and cleaned up Khurram Shahzad, bowled one outside off to Rizwan, almost on the sixth stump. And the right-hander, looking to make the most of the room, drove at it without coming in the line of the ball, only to get a nick back to the keeper.
On the very next ball, Mahmud bowled yet another peach of a delivery, much like the one he had bowled to Shahzad last evening. The difference between the two wickets was the nick. While Shahzad had failed to get even an inch of willow on the ball, which clipped the top of off, Mohammad Ali got a nick straight to Shanto, who got some good catching practice.
Abrar Ahmed became Nahid’s fourth scalp and it started a race between the two young Bangladeshi pacers as to who would end up with a five-wicket haul. It was eventually Mahmud who got Mir Hamza caught in the slips to register the fourth-best figures by a Bangladeshi pacer, ever, on foreign soil.
Lazy batting by Pakistan batters
Barring the ones that got the wickets of Shahzad, Ali, Shakeel and the one on which Rizwan was dropped, none of the deliveries forced the batters to play a shot at them. It was all about patience. The pitch map of the wickets below shows how the Pakistani batters failed to show any patience and discipline.
Bangladeshi bowlers showed that patience by keeping the grouping in the right channel of 'short' and 'short of good length', forcing the hosts to make mistakes, much like how they did in the second innings of the first Test.
The only difference in this Test was that all the 10 wickets in Pakistan’s second innings fell to pacers, making it the first instance when Bangladesh fast bowlers dismissed the opposition entirely without the help of spin.
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