Soumya Sarkar left dejected after his ‘brainfade’ of exposing Nayeem Hasan to Zahir Khan

Bangladesh made a lot of changes in the lineup from the first innings in the one-off Test against Afghanistan at the Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium in Chattogram. Soumya Sarkar, who opened the batting first time around, came as low as number eight in the second innings. And he came in at a situation when the Tigers, led by Shakib Al Hasan, needed him to hold one end up.

The hosts were chasing a monstrous 398 in the fourth innings and he had his skipper Shakib by his side. The southpaw had to wait for a long time to bat on the fifth day as rain dominated proceedings. In the end, he was in with a task of playing out 18.3 overs in the last day to save Bangladesh from the embarrassment of a Test defeat versus Rashid Khan and Co.

Soumya Sarkar wrongly takes a single

But he couldn’t help his team evade the defeat. Soumya got 15 runs and was the last wicket to fall. Rashid, who finished with 11 wickets in the match, found the inside edge of his bat, only to be caught by Ibrahim Zadran at short leg. In the over prior to that, Soumya made a mistake, which could’ve ended the match there itself. He gave the strike to number 11 Nayeem Hasan.

Zahir Khan, who nipped out Shakib in the very first ball of the day, had the ball in hand. Soumya drove a full-length ball through the covers and immediately set off for a single. Just after he completed the run, he realised the error. Immediately, his hands went up on his head. Four balls were still remaining in the 61st over and Zahir could easily have pinned Nayeem.

Fortunately for the Tigers, Nayeem played out the rest of the deliveries with utmost care. But Soumya, in the next over, couldn’t stave off Rashid’s venom and Afghanistan won the match by 224 runs. Sarkar had a tough time in the first innings as well. The Satkhira-born could manage only 17 runs off 66 balls, before Mohammad Nabi, who retired from Test cricket, trapped him.

Here is the video of Soumya giving Nayeem the strike