Riding on some excellent performances from Mahmudullah, Mushfiqar Rahim, Rubel Hossain and skipper Mashrafe Mortaza, Bangladesh defeated England by 15 runs at Adelaide and also knocked them out of the quarter-final race of the ICC World Cup 2015. This was also the first time that Bangladesh managed to qualify for the quarter-finals in World Cup.
Let us check out what the captains of the respective teams and Mahmudullah, who scored a match winning hundred, had to say after the match:
Eoin Morgan, England Captain:
Pretty poor to be knocked out this early from a World Cup. Unbelievably disappointing. I thought the guys bowled well at half time, especially with the short boundaries and the way the wicket played. We bowled reasonably well, but we couldn’t quite match it up with the bat. I can’t pick where it went wrong. I am gutted at the moment.
We struggled and fought and fought our way to try and get through to the quarter-finals, and then from there find a way through to the last few games. Again, the changes we made at the start of the tournament were necessary. The two again we made today were also necessary. We had gone four games into the group stages without the results we wanted. It ultimately comes down to the performance, and some of them did, but not all of us as a unit. We have tried to address the problem, but obviously it hasn’t worked. Our expectations were higher than the way we performed, so it is obviously disappointing. No idea what will happen from here. Again, there will be an inquest over the next few weeks to see what went wrong, and then we will go from there.
Mashrafe Mortaza, Bangladesh Captain:
Feel very proud and a special thanks to the team management and coaching staff, and of course to the boys as well. Thought the wicket was really good and we had to bowl well. In the start we were not so good, but in the middle we came back well. Mahmudullah scored his first hundred for Bangladesh, and Mushfiqur was also brilliant at the end. I think Rubel Hossain will be very happy now as he picked up four crucial wickets. Tamim did feel really bad after that dropped catch, as he is one of our best fielders, but in the end it didn’t matter. Really happy for all those people back home who have wanted us to make it this far. This is for you guys. We had a good combination today, especially with the seven batsmen. They showed their guts today, and the bowlers then did a very good job.
Mahmudullah, Man of the Match:
Really impressed by the attitude of our boys. All the boys chipped in and everything went well. I was just trying to bat properly and not think too much. Soumya batted really well, along with Mushy, who was the aggressor towards the end. We thought we were about 15-20 runs short initially, but we thought that if we got early wickets, then we were in with a chance. For us this victory is really special, and thank to all of the fans for supporting us. Tamim is one of the best fielders in our team, so a catch can be dropped in the match. The way Rubel bowled those last two balls, was just something really special.