Pace bowler Rubel Hossain proved his worth to the Bangladesh cricket team by uplifting the Tigers morale through his fiery opening spell against South Africa in the second one-day international at Mirpur on Sunday. Rubel was sidelined in the opening game of the three-match ODI against South Africa as the think-tank felt he wasn’t be capable of having an impact on the visitors with his pace, due to their mastery of it.
Rubel did not take long to show where he belonged after being included in the do-or-die affair for Tigers and successfully injected some belief in the mind of his team-mates by putting pressure on the opponent, a rare occasion in the ongoing series so far.
Rubel uprooted the off-stump of Proteas skipper Hashim Amla in his second over and kept on tormenting his counterparts with his pace, coupled with his line and length, to produce an impressive opening spell of 4-2-12-1.
Though it hardly looked productive wicket-wise, nevertheless, it served his team-mates with a timely tonic that helped in bringing down their opponents into an uncomfortable mental state.
South Africa had already brought down the Tigers to earth as they swept away the two-match Twenty20 series and followed it with a comprehensive eight-wicket win in the opening ODI, suggesting it wouldn’t be much different from the Twenty20.
However, Bangladesh had a completely changed body language in this game where they start taking control of it after the departure of the reliable Amla.
Tigers picked their tempo as ace spinner Sakib al Hasan and Rubel came to the attack after Mashrafee opted to introduce new bowlers from both ends that helped them resist Proteas from scoring freely.
Nasir picked 3-24 with his off-spin while Mustafiz grabbed 3-38 benefitting from the visitors badly looking to increase the run-rate that eventually cost them dearly, when they were bundled out for a meagre 162 all out in 46 overs.
-With New Age input
