It was good to see Bangladesh make a bit of a fight of it against the Kiwis moving from 80 odd for 5 overnight to an eventual 282 to 'only' lose by 121 runs.
Yet again the lower order helped the Tigers retain some credibility with Shakib's maiden test ton sounding like it was a great knock. He even took the fight to Vettori and scored 40 odd runs off only 13 deliveries.
Following on from Mahmudullah's recent contributions, which culminated with a ton in the first innings and a 40 today, and consistent runs from Mushfiqur Rahim, it seems Bangladesh have adopted a strange batting strategy.
Put the best batsmen at six, seven and eight (where Mahmudullah averages nearly 50 albeit from only 5 tests), throw caution to the wind at the top and then recover after the inevitable batting collapse.
Only once in their last few tests has a top order batsman made a significant contribution - Tamim Iqbal's wonderful century against India. Other than that it has been left up to Shakib, Rahim and Mahmudullah to continually pick up the pieces.
No wonder Bangladesh always lose. Their supposed best batsman Mohammad Ashraful averages a paltry 22.78 in over 50 tests. That is lower than Nathan Hauritz. Case closed.
Time to change the strategy guys.
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