Bangladesh bowlers again failed to wrap up the opposition innings quickly after making an incision in the middle-order as the West Indies put up 450-9 before declaring their first innings of the first Test at the Sir Vivian Richards Stadium in Antigua on Saturday.聽
Bangladesh, coming to bat, found themselves in trouble early in the innings as they lost both openers within 21 runs in consecutive overs.
Zakir Hasan (15 off 34) was inside-edged to get bowled off Jayden Seals, while Mahmudul Hasan edged to slip off Alzari Joseph after making five off 33.聽
Mominul Haque and Shahadat Hossain steadied the ship a bit and remained unbeaten at the end of the second day when the visitors were trailing by 410 runs.聽
Starting the second day on 250-5, the Caribbean鈥檚 soon slipped to 261-7 when Hasan Mahmud struck twice with the second new ball in consecutive overs to start the day on a high note.
But Justin Greaves, playing in his third Test, added 140 runs with Kemar Roach for the eighth wicket, the joint highest partnership of the innings.
Together they batted for almost 48 overs鈥攖he longest of the innings in terms of deliveries faced.
Roach scored 47 runs off 144 deliveries, marking his highest score in an innings and the most balls he has faced in a single innings. He became Hasan鈥檚 third victim, but Greaves continued to frustrate the Bangladesh bowlers.
He got to his hundred before the tea break. The West Indies added 197 runs for the last four wickets, while 189 runs came from the last three.聽
Since the start of 2021, opponents have the second highest average (26.50) per dismissal for seventh-tenth wickets against Bangladesh.聽
Bangladesh also endured the most hundred-run partnerships during this time period, with eight. England are second with six.
For the last four wickets, since 2021, there have been 18 times that a team scored at least 200 runs.
Notably, the highest three occurrences each took place against Bangladesh and England.
The two such instances came from the last two series against South Africa in Mirpur and India in Chennai for Bangladesh.
In both the Tests, Bangladesh were in a commanding position but lost the grip as the tail-venom bit.聽
Bangladesh have been playing with five specialist bowlers in this match鈥攖hree pacers and two spinners. They didn鈥檛 concede too many runs, as four of them bowled with an economy rate of under three.聽
But the lack of killer blow to the opposition tail continues to hurt them.
