5 Bangladesh Cricket facts that sound fake but are actually true

Bangladesh cricket, over the last two decades, has been a mixture of greatness and controversy. Ever since they started taking baby steps amongst the big boys of the sport, they have managed to capture the imaginations of the fans and the cricket fraternity.

In the last 20 years, they have furrowed eyebrows after beating quite a few big teams with a sheer amount of dominance and audacity. The likes of Tamim Iqbal, Mustafizur Rahman, and Shakib Al Hasan have made hay with some stupendous brand of cricket.

But over the years, their cricket has also been a witness to some surprising moments. Even as some of them are worth rejoicing, a handful of them has tarnished their image to some extent. Nevertheless, they have kept producing talents, who have taken the sport forward.

In the article, let’s take a look at 5 Bangladesh cricket facts that are surprisingly true:

1. Mohammad Ashraful once dismissed AB de Villiers

Mohammad Ashraful, during his heydays, was known for his fearless brand of cricket. Though he averaged in the 20s for a chunk of his career for Bangladesh, he was the face of their cricket owing to his style of play. He also had 47 wickets for the Tigers from 261 matches.

One of those scalps was of former South African batsman AB de Villiers back in 2008 at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium. The dismissal was a rather bizarre one, to say the least. In the Proteas’ first innings of the opening Test in Dhaka, de Villiers notched 46 runs off 73 balls with seven fours and one six.

In the first ball of his only over, Ashraful bowled a half-tracker and the ball bounced twice before de Villiers went for a pull. The batsman miscued the shot and Ashraful took a simple catch of his own bowling to send the batsman packing.