Sri Lanka vs Bangladesh, Asia Cup 2022 Highlights: SL beat BAN by 2 wickets in thriller, through to Super Fours

Afif takes on the long boundary and clears it with ease. Hasaranga bowls to his pads, whips out a sweep and the ball goes sailing over deep square leg. 

Ripper from Theekshana. Shakib has been making room for himself throughout the innings and Theekshana gets that ball to turn just a little bit. Ball crashes on to the middle stump and Shakib seems absolutely livid with himself for that. 

Shakib Al Hasan b Theekshana 24 (22), Bangladesh 87/4 in 10.4 overs

Talk about entertainment! The momentum has shifted one way to another already in these first 10 overs, at the end of which, it is with Bangladesh thanks to their captain Shakib Al Hasan. He is on 23 off 20 balls and he has Afif Hossain at the other end with 6 off three.

Same shot from Shakib, maybe a little more close to fine leg but it doesn't matter, it runs to the boundary anyhow. Shakib starting to look more assured now. 

Very first ball of the 10th over from Karunaratne and Shakib moves across and scoops it between the keeper and fine leg. 6000 T20 runs for Shakib. 

Pitched at leg, Shakib makes room and goes over short extra cover. That races to the boundary. Right after that, Shakib sends Bangladesh to panic stations, trying a big mow down the ground. It had no distance on it but it was too much distance for long-on to cover as well and he is safe. 

That is a huge wicket, what a delivery from Chamika Karunaratne to get it as well. Back of a length jagging way, Mushfiqur tries to stay in the line of the ball, ends up getting an outside edge to the wicketkeeper.

Mushfiqur c Mendis b Karunaratne 4 (5), Bangladesh 63/3 in 8 overs

Wanindu Hasaranga makes the difference, big cross-batted slog from Miraz and he loses his stumps. 

Mehidy Hasan Miraz b Hasaranga 38 (26), Bangladesh 58/2 in 6.5 overs

The field is in and so Miraz has settled in outside the inner circle. Bouncer from Madushanka and Miraz slashes at it, goes well over the infield and reaches the boundary. He is on 36 off 22 now, Bangladesh are 53/1 in 5.4 overs. What a start. 

A scoop while hardly bending down straight over the wicketkeeper's head. Miraz has been sent in to get that pinch-hitting start, he is doing exactly that at the moment. He is on 24 off 16 now. 

Edged and gone! It's the debutant who gets the breakthrough for Sri Lanka. Brilliant delivery, jumped up on Sabbir and he gets an edge on his attempted pull shot. Kusal Mendis has an easy take. 

Sabbir Rahman c Mendis b Fernando 5 (6), Bangladesh 19/1 in 12.5 overs

Sabbir whips out a paddle sweep and the ball flies up, fine leg is in which means that it lands in no-man's land and the ball rolls to the boundary. 

Mehidy Hasan Miraz and Sabbir Rahman open for Bangladesh, Dilshan Madushanka has the ball in his hands.

Right then, the two teams have lined up in the middle for their national anthems. Some handshakes between them later after which Sri Lanka get into the team huddle. 

We are going to bowl first. It's a used wicket, so chasing will be important. We had a good preparation coming into this game. We need to concentrate on our batting. We will try to play as we have been playing in the last two years. The team that comes up with a good performance, wins.

"To be honest we haven't talked about [the talk in the media] at all, we just want to focus on our performances," that's all he had to say about that. “We wanted to field first, but it's not in our control. If we can keep wickets in hand we can utilise the last 10 overs. [In the last game] we didn't bat well. If we bat well and keep wickets in hand today, it'll be a good game.”

Bangladesh: Sabbir Rahman, Mushfiqur Rahim(w), Shakib Al Hasan(c), Afif Hossain, Mahmudullah, Mosaddek Hossain, Mahedi Hasan, Taskin Ahmed, Mehidy Hasan Miraz, Mustafizur Rahman, Ebadot Hossain

Sri Lanka: Pathum Nissanka, Kusal Mendis(w), Charith Asalanka, Danushka Gunathilaka, Bhanuka Rajapaksa, Wanindu Hasaranga, Dasun Shanaka(c), Chamika Karunaratne, Maheesh Theekshana, Dilshan Madushanka, Asitha Fernando

Sri Lanka win the toss, choose to bowl. Affable handshake between Shakib and Shanaka, no extension of “The War” here.  

Right, let's get down to the thing that we are here for. No, not the cricket match, there is still about 40 minutes to go for that. It's the word-arrows that have flown before this game. No “the opposition is strong” “we will control the controllables” and stuff here. Sri Lanka captain Dasun Shanaka started proceedings, saying that his team will be facing an "easier opponent" than Afghanistan because they are not aware of any good bowlers in Bangladesh apart from Shakib Al Hasan and Mustafizur Rahman. It has to be noted that this came right after Sri Lanka were shredded to pieces in every cricketing manner imaginable by Afghanistan so, Shanaka might have messed up his timing a bit. Bangladesh team director Khaled Mahmud replied by saying: “It's upto Dasun, why he said that or why he thinks we are (easier opponent). Maybe Afghanistan has a better T20 squad, that's why he said that. He said a lot of other things as well, he said we have only 2 (world-class) bowlers or something. I don't see any in Sri Lanka, at least Bangladesh have two. That's very good. We have at least Mustafizur and Shakib, I don't think they have world -class bowlers like them."

Sri Lanka last won in 2014 and that was their fifth title. At the time, that helped them equal India as the most succesfull nation in the Asia Cup and matches against Bangladesh were never seen as a difficult one for them. They are also the only team apart from India to defend their title, having won it back to back in 2004 and 2008. It has been an extraordinary downhill dive for Sri Lankan fans to witness since 2016 and it has been reflected in the Asia Cup. 

Pathum Nissanka, Kusal Mendis(w), Charith Asalanka, Danushka Gunathilaka, Bhanuka Rajapaksa, Wanindu Hasaranga, Dasun Shanaka(c), Chamika Karunaratne, Maheesh Theekshana, Matheesha Pathirana, Dilshan Madushanka, Dinesh Chandimal, Dhananjaya de Silva, Jeffrey Vandersay, Asitha Fernando, Ashen Bandara, Praveen Jayawickrama, Nuwanidu Fernando, Pramod Madushan, Nuwan Thushara

Mohammad Naim, Anamul Haque, Shakib Al Hasan(c), Mushfiqur Rahim(w), Afif Hossain, Mahmudullah, Mosaddek Hossain, Mahedi Hasan, Mohammad Saifuddin, Taskin Ahmed, Mustafizur Rahman, Sabbir Rahman, Nasum Ahmed, Mehidy Hasan Miraz, Ebadot Hossain, Parvez Hossain Emon

Since beating Pakistan in the 2014 final, Sri Lanka have lost six successive games in the Asia Cup, including five T20I defeats. In a way, this might just be the ultimate match of the underdogs, something that would've never happened if this was being played at any point in the first half of the past decade or the one before that. In the way that Sri Lanka would've been seen as the outright favourites. 

Bangladesh have lost all the six T20Is they have played in the UAE and have crossed 150 only once. That did happen against Sri Lanka last year. They also faired far better than Sri Lanka did in the match against Afghanistan. 

On-field arguments, Nazmul Islam inventing the naagin dance phenom and a broken Bangladesh dressing room door at the Khettarama stadium, despite the fact that they won the match. It was quite a game, with Sri Lanka scoring 159/7 thanks to half centuries from the two Pereras, Kusal and Thisara. Bangladesh then chased it down with two wickets and as many balls to spare.