Bangladesh fall to Wagner’s short stuff after Tamim blazes hundred

Neil Wagner derailed Bangladesh with a five-wicket haul as the visitors, bowled out for 234, had their bright morning turn into a wasteful afternoon. 

Wagner employed the short ball effectively, grabbing the narrative which for most parts of the first three hours belonged to Tamim Iqbal's forceful 126, reports ESPNcricinfo.

He had helped Bangladesh to 122 for 2 in the first session, after which New Zealand bagged five wickets in the second session. Mohammad Mithun and Mahmudullah top edged hooks off Wagner, while Soumya Sarkar couldn't get his hands out of the way of a Tim Southee delivery pitched back of a length.

All three dismissals looked avoidable, given that both had otherwise looked resourceful when finding gaps in other areas of the field.

Mehidy Hasan also surrendered to a Wagner short ball, which was caught at short leg: 122 for 2 turned into 217 for 7 by tea, undoing almost all of Bangladesh's great work from the morning session. Wagner completed his sixth five-for with the wickets of Abu Jayed and Liton Das early in the final session.

Southee, despite being struck for ten fours by Tamim, finished with three wickets as the New Zealand attack used the short ball very well. But it had been a very different morning for Bangladesh.

Tamim led the way with 57 and 64-run stands for the first two wickets, respectively, with Shadman Islam and Mominul Haque. While both these batsmen played false and avoidable, shots, Tamim enacted a proper mix of caution and aggression as he left and defended anything threatening, and went after almost every bad ball.

He struck 15 fours in the first session in which he reached 86 off 85 balls, before he brought up his hundred, also with a flurry of boundaries. He continued on the attack after reaching three figures, hooking Southee over square-leg for his only six, buut his dismissal was soft - guiding a Colin de Grandhomme's half-tracker to gully - opposite of how he had approached the rest of the innings.

But there was no support from the other end as several of Bangladesh's top seven looked set before going too hard on short balls.