Bangladesh leg-spinner Fahima Khatun said that her team plans to use their strengths to challenge Australia in the upcoming matches to keep their hopes alive in the three-match ODI series.
Bangladesh lost the first match of the series by 118 runs. Now, they need to stop Australia in the second ODI to avoid losing the series.
In the first match, Bangladesh bowlers did well initially, making Australia struggle at 78 for 5. But Annabel Sutherland scored a fifty (58 off 76) and, with Alana King, helped Australia recover to 213 for 7.
Bangladesh couldn’t perform well with the bat and were all out for just 95 runs.
Fahima said, “In the second match, we’ll focus on our bowling and fielding strengths to restrict Australia to a low total.”
She believes their bowlers did a good job, but small mistakes cost them. She mentioned that they have been working hard on their fielding and want to avoid mistakes.
Fahima faced some tough overs, especially the last one where she conceded 29 runs, mainly due to Alana King’s hitting.
“The team trusted me to bowl the final over. I did my best, but King played really well. It happens in the game, and we’ll try to do better in the next match,” Fahima said.
Sutherland, from the Australian team, mentioned that they found the conditions in Mirpur tough but were happy to adapt. She emphasized the importance of building partnerships during batting and praised her team’s effort in challenging conditions.