Tigers 'tottering' to chase 216 in first Afghan ODI

Upon restricting the visitors to just 215 in their first one-dayer at the Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium in Chattogram on Wednesday. Bangladesh are now batting amid a poor start as they lost both openers-- Tamim and Liton-- with just 14 runs on the score board.

Soon after that, even Mushfiq too departed when the team's total score reaced just 18. Debutant Yasir made a frustrating start as he was removed for a duck. 

Afghanistan won the toss and opted to bat first before the brilliant show from "cutter master" Mustafizur Rahman came. He bagged 3 wickets for 35. 

Meanwhile, Shakib Al Hasan, Taskin Ahmed and Shoriful Islam took two wickets each, with Mahmudullah claiming just one.

For the tourists, Nazibullah Zadran scored highest 67 off 84 balls while Rahmat Shah's 34 was the second best score.

Bangladesh will try logging all 30 points from three matches given that they would next visit South Africa for a three-match ODI. And no doubt winning at least a match in South Africa would be an extremely tough task for them.

Bangladesh had played 12 matches in four series so far in ICC ODI Super League and won eight matches.

The Tigers played two series away against Zimbabwe and New Zealand. While they whitewashed Zimbabwe in a three-match series, they were being swept in New Zealand. At home, they whitewashed the West Indies and beat Sri Lanka by 2-1.

The Tigers are currently placed at second position in ICC ODI Super League with 80 points, largely due to the fact that the big teams are yet to play a good amount of matches. In this context, 30 points from the Afghanistan series would keep Bangladesh at a good stead. Even a loss of 10 points or a match means they would be on the backfoot.

But the task won’t be easier for them even though Bangladesh are always a tough side in ODI cricket at least at home.

In the head to head battle between the two sides, Bangladesh are ahead with 5-3 results in eight matches.

Bangladesh also won the latest two matches—by 3 runs in Asia Cup in 2018 and 62 runs in the 2019 World Cup but every time they played against Afghans, they appeared to be in huge pressure as a defeat against the Asian rivals generally invites harsh criticism from fans and pundits.

Afghanistan are still unbeaten in ICC ODI Super League, winning all six matches but they played against low ranked Ireland and Netherlands. They are in the sixth position in the point table but they know a series win against Bangladesh will keep them in good position.