‘Bangladesh still have room for improvement’

BASSETERRE, Saint Kitts and Nevis: Bangladesh cannot lose sight of their need to improve consistently after the One-day International series win over West Indies, captain Mashrafe Mortaza has warned.

The 18-run win in Basseterre on Saturday came after Tamim Iqbal, Mahmudullah and Mashrafe combined to put up a big score, before Rubel Hossain and Mehidy Hasan Miraz took key wickets to stall the home side’s progress, leaving Rovman Powell, despite his big-hitting, too much to do in the last 10 overs.

“If you consider the last three or four months, we really needed to win this series,” Mashrafe said.“It is a good sign ahead of the Asia Cup. But we have a lot to improve. A series win isn’t everything. We have missed out on a lot of areas.”

Tamim Iqbal, who was adjudged player of the match for his second hundred in the ODI series, said coming back after a disastrous Test series made the ODI series win more pleasing. Bangladesh broke many unenviable records with their batting performances in the two Tests.

“It is a very pleasing win,” he said.“I think we won an ODI series [for the first time] after 2016 although we won matches during this period. It was very important that we did well in the ODI series after the way the Test matches went.”