Pakistan clean sweep Test series

The resistance of Shakib Al Hasan, Mushfiqur Rahim and Liton Das wasn’t enough to save Bangladesh from the humiliation of an innings defeat as they lost the second Test by an innings and eight runs against Pakistan at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium in Dhaka on Wednesday.
Shakib top-scored for Bangladesh with 63 while Mushfiq and Liton made 48 and 45 respectively but their efforts couldn’t make up for the top-order collapse as Bangladesh got bundled out in their second innings for 205.
Sajid Khan took four wickets in the second innings to finish with career-best match figures of 12-128, which also won him the player of the match award.
With the win, Pakistan completed a 2-0 clean sweep over the hosts as they had earlier won the first Test in Chattogram by eight wickets.
This was also the first series of the ICC World Test Championship 2021-23 for Bangladesh, which they ended without scoring any points.
Bangladesh had also been clean-swept in the preceding three-match Twenty20 series against the visitors.
The day began with Bangladesh on 76-7, needing another 25 runs to avoid follow on, with Shakib and Taijul unbeaten on 23 and 0 respectively.
But Sajid, who had taken six wickets the previous day, struck twice and Shaheen Shah Afridi took one wicket to end Bangladesh’s first innings on 87.
Pakistan did not hesitate to enforce the follow on and Shaheen and Hasan Ali proved the decision to be correct in no time.
Shaheen and Hasan struck twice each in their opening spell as the Bangladesh top-order for the fourth time in the series collapsed like a house of cards and the team was left reeling on 25-4 in just the ninth over.
Mushfiq and Liton then came to Bangladesh’s rescue with a solid 73-run stand.
Just when the duo was looking comfortable, Liton struck a half-volley off Sajid straight into the hands of Fawad Alam who juggled the ball a bit before completing the catch.
After Liton’s dismissal, Shakib and Mushfiq began consolidating the innings and were on the verge of going into the Tea break unbroken.
But disaster struck in the final over of the session when Shakib attempted to take a quick single and Mushfiq, running towards the striker’s end, put in a desperate dive to survive but his bat was found to be in the air when Mohammad Rizwan whipped the bails of the wickets and Bangladesh went into Tea on 147-6.
Shakib and Mehidy Hasan got together after the break and batted together for 23.1 overs and added 45 runs and it seemed like Bangladesh would somehow eke out a draw.
After the frontline bowlers failed to break the stand, skipper Babar Azam put himself in the attack and ended up claiming his first wicket in international cricket by trapping Mehidy leg before wicket for 14.
Sajid then claimed his 10th wicket in the match in the very next over by going through the defenses of Shakib and also removed Khaled Ahmed for a duck shortly.
Taijul Islam and Ebadot Hossain fought hard and batted another 5.4 overs but in the end Sajid trapped Taijul in front for five and won the match for Pakistan
Earlier, Pakistan declared their first innings for 300-4 on the fourth day after rain and poor lights only allowed 63.2 overs of action in the first three days.