Najmul-Mominul strike fifties vs HP

Najmul Hossain Shanto and Mominul Haque struck fifties for Bangladesh A team in their second four-day match against Bangladesh HP team as they scored 223 for nine wickets by the end of the first day’s play.

Najmul scored 72, whereas skipper Mominul scored 62.

After winning the toss, HP skipper Akbar Ali opted to field first, and pacer Sumon Khan brought him results straight away dismissing both the A team openers- Saif Hasan and Shadman Islam for 2 and 6 respectively.

From there on, Najmul and Mominul built an 88-run stand to bring some stability back to their innings. But Rejaur Rahman struck to send Mominul back, and soon, left-arm spinner Hasan Murad struck thrice to remove Mohammad Mithun (5), Yasir Ali (0) and Irfan Sukkur (0) in short time to reduce the A team to 116-6.

Najmul, then, put up a 65-run stand with Naeem Hasan to take them near 200, but then Shahadat Hossain struck to remove the left-handed batsman for 72. Hasan then sent Naeem back for 32 almost immediately to reduced them to 181-8.

But a late cameo from Shahidul Islam that saw him score 36 off just 31 deliveries took the A team to 223 before Shahidul was out in the final delivery of the day as Hasan claimed his fifth wicket.

The left-arm spinner ended the day with the figures of 5-47, with Sumon ending with 2-36.