Bangladesh lost to England by 36 runs in a limited over exhibition match at the Bangladesh Krira Shikkha Protisthan (BKSP) ground yesterday but not before giving a good fight against their mighty counterparts.
Chasing a commanding England total of 229 for nine in 50 overs, the home side were 193 for nine at the end with skipper Aminul Islam unbeaten on 60.
But his well-deserved half century was not good enough for Bangladesh as the middle-order once again demonstrated how to lose a match from a possible winning position.
Bangladesh, who reached 100 in the 28th over with the loss of only two wickets, lost seven wickets in the next 22 overs adding another 93 runs.
After opener Sajjad Ahmed made an early exit scoring only 10 runs with Bangladesh on 18, Javed Omar, the other opening batsman, and one-down Faruque Ahmed made an excellent recovery with a 55-run second wicket partnership.
The pair was broken when Javed, the right hander, tried to sweep left-arm spinner Anthony Giles but was bowled behind his legs after scoring 36 off 72 balls which included a quartet of boundaries.
After Javed's departure, skipper Aminul joined former national captain Faruque Ahmed and took the score across the one hundred mark, which raised hopes among the ten thousand partisan crowd witnessing the match.
But that was not to happen because of Scottish medium pacer Dougie Brown, who took four wickets for 15 runs in seven overs to push Bangladesh to the back seat from 103 for two to 132 for six in the space of ten overs.
Faruque was first to go giving a top edge to wicketkeeper Jack Russell after scoring 28 off 59 balls followed by Al-Shahriar who aimed high on a wide ball off Brown by going down the wicket but miscued, leaving a simple job for wicketkeeper Russell, who removed the bails in a flash.
Brown, who plays county cricket for Warwickshire, then trapped vice-captain Khaled Mahmud leg before for 3 and bowled Khaled Masood for 2 to put England well and back in the match.
After Masood's return with Bangladesh on 132 for six in the 38th overs, skipper Aminul played with an added sense of responsibility but was hardly supported by any one of his colleagues. The ACC trophy winning captain took only 75 balls for his unbeaten 60 which included five sweetly timed hits across the rope.
Earlier, put into bat, the England innings was built around two superb knocks from middle orders Graham Lloyd and Neil Fairbrother who added 88 runs in the fifth wicket stand.
Lloyd, who was dropped by Sajjad Ahmad at deep mid-on when he was on only eight, hammered 61 off 66 balls with the help of seven boundaries. Left handed Fairbrother chipped in with 48 off 72 balls.
Among others, left-hand opener Nick Knight scored 27 while Graham Hick added 18 with a six and a four.
Left-arm spinner Mohammad Rafique was the most successful bowler of the day taking five wickets for 47 runs in nine overs while right-arm medium pacer Shafiuddin Ahmed, who ripped through the England top order with his lethal pace, finished with three for 44 from his ten overs.
After the match, the England skipper Adam Hollioake said that Friday's match against Bangladesh was a better and more competitive game of the two played at the BKSP in the last three days.
``I'm very impressed with them, they are very intelligent cricketers - they are obviously very used to this surface and the way they set their field it shows their depth of knowledge about the game and I'm very pleased with that,'' added Hollioake.
On the other hand, Bangladesh skipper Aminul Islam blamed his batsmen for the defeat.
``I wanted to win this match and I worked on that for the last couple of days. But the way Javed Omar and Faruque threw their wickets, it was shocking. They should have stayed there and tried to get some more runs because Khaled Mahmud can not score everyday,'' said a demoralised Aminul.
``But I can tell you, today's performance will definitely help us when we take on West Indies 'A' next month,'' added Aminul.