Tea Bangladesh 470 for 7 (Mushfiqur 195*, Mehidy 40*, Jarvis 5-71) v Zimbabwe
Mushfiqur Rahim solidified Bangladesh’s dominance on the second day in Mirpur with an epic unbeaten 393-ball 195 that stretched well over eight hours and carried his team to 470 for 7 at tea. Mushfiqur added an unbroken 92 for the eighth wicket with Mehidy Hasan and went to the interval within touching distance of what could be the first Test double-hundred of 2018, while the milestone of becoming the first wicketkeeper to hit two Test double-tons is within his reach.
Mushfiqur’s marathon knock meant that Bangladesh were able to weather a five-wicket haul from Zimbabwe seamer Kyle Jarvis. While Jarvis was probing in every spell he bowled, Zimbabwe were hampered by an injury to his seam-bowling partner Tendai Chatara. Chatara pulled up short running up to bowl the third delivery of his 22nd over of the innings, clutching his left thigh and wincing in pain. He was stretchered off with a suspected grade 2 quadriceps muscle strain, and Zimbabwe lost a leader of their attack for the remainder of the match.
In his absence, Jarvis struck twice in the first half-hour after lunch to pick up his third five-for in Tests. Mahmudullah poked well away from his body to send a thin edge through to wicketkeeper Regis Chakabva, falling for 36 in Jarvis’ first over after the lunch interval. His dismissal snapped the sixth-wicket stand at 73, and soon afterwards Ariful Haque failed to ride Jarvis’ bounce to present Brian Chari with a simple chance at gully.
At the other end, however, Mushfiqur held firm. A slash over the slips brought up his 150, which took up 334 balls and five minutes short of eight hours at the crease. The dismissals, along with Mehidy’s positive approach from the get-go, hastened Mushfiqur’s approach at the crease. He greeted Sikandar Raza’s introduction for the first time in the day by twice using his feet to get down the track, driving inside-out through cover and then clobbering the first six of the innings over midwicket.
Mehidy collected boundaries off Sean Williams and Donald Tiripano, and survived a very sharp chance when a slashed edge off Raza flew fast to Hamilton Masakadza’s left at slip, the Zimbabwe captain managing only to palm the ball away. He also survived a referral for an lbw appeal, while in the last over before tea, desperate Zimbabwe also reviewed a not-out decision by umpire Kumar Dharmasena when they thought they had Mushfiqur caught behind. Replays showed that Mushfiqur had got nothing on it, and he marched off at the interval unbeaten.
Mushfiqur’s acceleration in the afternoon stood in stark contrast to his morning go-slow, when he faced 55 deliveries in the first session before he hit his first boundary. There was no hint of the impatient, limited-overs batting style that blighted Bangladesh’s efforts in the first Test, and Mushfiqur and Mahmudullah progressed through the morning very much in Test mode.
Mushfiqur had been the fortunate recipient of another missed chance in the field by Zimbabwe in the fourth over of the morning, when Chakabva tumbled to his right but failed to hold onto a thin inside edge that had ricocheted off the batsman’s pad.
Mushfiqur doubled down his defence in response, taking an hour and a half to score his first ten runs of the day, but then unfurled the sweep shot to good effect against Zimbabwe’s spinners, collecting boundaries off Williams and Brandon Mavuta.
As he batted on and on through to tea, he found increasing momentum, picking the right ball to attack, and making the Zimbabwe bowlers toil hard in the sun.