Ordinary Bangladesh suffer shock 5-wicket defeat to USA in first T20I

Bangladesh had an ordinary day at the office as they suffered a shock defeat to the USA in the first T20I at the Prairie View Cricket Complex in Houston on Wednesday. This is undoubtedly the biggest upset in the history of  USA's cricket.

This is only the second instance of the USA beating a Full Member nation. They beat Ireland in 2021.

Mustafizur Rahman's two-wicket 12th over brought the visitors back in the game after an ordinary start with the ball. Still, USA's Corey Anderson and Harmeet Singh's 62-run partnership for the sixth wicket took the game away from Bangladesh.

This was USA's highest for the 6th wicket in T20Is, breaking the record of 42 between Nisarg Patel and Malhotra.

Corey scored 34 runs off 24 balls, and Harmeet Singh scored 33 runs off 13 balls.

Apart from Mustafizur's brace, Shakib Al Hasan and Mahedi Hasan bowled reasonably well, while the other bowlers were quite expensive. Bangladesh bowlers gave away 12 extras including 7 wides.

Earlier, Towhid Hridoy stood tall amid the ruins and notched up a half-century but the USA kept Bangladesh to 153-6 in 20 overs.

Hridoy (58 off 47) struck four fours and two sixes on the way to his second fifty in T20Is.

Fast bowler Ali Khan bowled well up front, extracting some seam movement to beat the bat of Bangladesh's top-order batters. 

Litton Das and Soumya Sarkar helped Bangladesh get off to a decent beginning as the duo notched up 34-0 in the first four overs.

But the introduction of fast bowler Jessy Singh worked wonders for the hosts. Litton (14 off 15), who was earlier dropped by captain Monank Patel off Khan on two, was trapped in front by Jessy. 

After conceding a wicket-maiden to Jessy, Bangladesh lost their other opener Soumya (23 off 15) as he picked out the fielder in the deep while attempting a sweep.

Captain Najmul Hossain Shanto struggled big time to get the ball away. Off-spinner Steven Taylor enjoyed bowling to two left-handers - Shanto and Shakib Al Hasan - and put a lot of pressure on Bangladesh with dot balls.

Shanto (three off 11) missed a reverse sweep and then was stumped by Patel off Taylor as he skipped down the wicket but failed to connect. 

Shakib (six off 12) soon was run out and Bangladesh were reeling at 68-4 in the 12th over.

Hridoy and Mahmudullah (31 off 22) got together and made a decent recovery. At one stage, the visitors' run rate fell below six an over but the duo added 67 off 47 for the fifth wicket to help Bangladesh to a respectable total.

Taylor was the pick of the bowlers with two wickets for nine runs in three overs. Saurabh Netravalkar and Jessy snared one scalp each.