Bangladeshi spinner Taijul Islam took 3 wickets, while Zimbabwean opener Innocent Kea scored a century.Image Credit source: PTI/Zimbabwe Cricket
For the past few days, most cricket fans’ attention has been focused on the upsets of the India-Ireland T20 series, the drama of the England-New Zealand Test series and the excitement of the Women’s T20 World Cup. Amidst all this, a test match is also being played in Harare, the capital of Zimbabwe, on which the world’s attention will be less but an amazing game is being seen here too. In this only Test match, Bangladeshi spinner Taijul Islam single-handedly took 7 wickets but he could not stop Zimbabwean batsman Innocent Kea, who returned to the team after 3 years, from scoring a century.
The match started at the Harare Sports Club on June 28, the day Ireland made a clean sweep of the Indian team in the T20 series, while the Indian women’s team was out of the T20 World Cup and during that time England’s Test captain Ben Stokes retired Was announced. In such a situation, little attention was paid to the action going on in Harare, but here the host Zimbabwe showed its dominance on the first day itself, which was maintained on the second day as well.
Returned to the team after 3 years, scored his first century
On the very first day of the match, Zimbabwe had bowled out Bangladesh for just 140 runs on the strength of its four tall fast bowlers. Out of these, 20 year old Newman Niamhuri, the youngest pacer of the team, took 4 wickets. As special as it was, the team’s batting was equally special because on the very first day, Zimbabwe had scored 136 runs losing only 1 wicket and Innocent Keya had scored 76 runs. Opener Innocent, who returned to the Test team for the first time since February 2023, took the innings forward on the second day and scored the first century of his Test career. This was only his third test match and in that he played an excellent inning of 140 runs.
7 batsmen trapped in Taijul’s net
Apart from Innocent, other Zimbabwe batsmen made the Bangladeshi bowlers yearn for wickets. In such a situation, Bangladesh’s most successful Test bowler Taijul Islam single-handedly brought the team back. Taijul ended the strong innings of Brian Bennett and then also put a break on the century innings of Innocent Keya. After this, left arm spinner Taijul achieved a special feat by sending back 7 Zimbabwe batsmen to the pavilion one by one.
This was the 19th time in Test cricket that he took 5 or more wickets in an innings. In this matter, he equaled the Bangladeshi record of Shakib Al Hasan and also completed his 300 wickets in international cricket. He also became only the fifth Bangladeshi bowler to do so. Not only this, this is the third time when Taijul was successful in taking 7 or more wickets in an innings. However, despite this, Zimbabwe scored 410 runs in the first innings and by the end of the second day, Bangladesh also lost one wicket for 40 runs in the second innings.
