On this day: Bangladesh make their 100th Test memorable by beating Sri Lanka
The Bangladesh cricket team has improved their performance to a great extent in the last five to six years. They reached the semi-finals in the 2015 ODI World Cup and the 2017 Champions Trophy. In Test matches as well, they have brought their best game on some of the occasions. On this day i.e. 19th March back in 2017, Bangladesh registered a memorable victory against Sri Lanka in their 100th Test match. This was the second Test of the Bangladesh tour of Sri Lanka. The hosts had earlier won the first game of the series by 259 runs. The visitors needed to show a great display of their skills to make a comeback and draw the series.
The memorable triumph
The Sri Lankan team won the toss in this game and opted to bat first. For them, Dinesh Chandimal slammed a magnificent century scoring 138 runs off 300 balls. This included 10 fours and 1 six in total. Sri Lanka scored 338 runs in 113.3 overs in the first innings. Mehedi Hasan was the pick of the bowlers for the visiting side taking 3 wickets for 90 runs in 21 overs.
Bangladesh responded strongly in response to Sri Lanka’s total scoring 467 runs in 134.1 overs. Veteran allrounder Shakib Al Hasan hit a brilliant century for them. He scored 116 runs off 159 balls including 10 fours. Mosaddek Hossain who came to bat at number 8 played a vital knock of 75 runs off 155 balls with the help of 7 fours and 2 sixes. Bangladesh took a lead of 129 runs in the first innings and now needed to wrap up the home team for a low score in the second innings.
Opener Dimuth Karunaratne hit a superb hundred in the third innings of the match, and it looked like Sri Lanka would recover their first-innings deficit. However, they soon collapsed from a score of 143/1 to a final total of 319 runs.
This meant Bangladesh required 191 runs in the fourth innings to win the Test match. They got good help from opener Tamim Iqbal in the chase who made 82 runs off 125 balls. On the fifth day, Bangladesh chased down the target in 57.5 overs and got a memorable victory by 4 wickets in their 100th Test.
