Sports Desk

Comilla Victorians clinched their fourth successive victory in the ongoing Bangladesh Premier League 2023 after they beat Dhaka Dominators by 60 runs in their seventh match at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium in Mirpur on Monday.

Comilla’s new Pakistani recruit Naseem Shah was the star of the show as the right-arm pacer claimed 4-12 on his BPL debut to help his side restrict Dhaka to 104-9 in 20 overs and guided his side move to the third spot in the points table.

Earlier, Johnson Charles made 32 off 25 balls while Khushdil Shah also struck 30 off 17 balls as Comilla posted 164-6 in their 20 overs after being sent into bat first.
This was Dhaka’s sixth consecutive defeat in the tournament and they remained at the bottom of the points table with two points from seven matches.

Naseem gave Comilla the first breakthrough in their defending the total when he uprooted the stumps of opener Mizanur Rahman (five) in his first over before Abu Hider Rony removed Soumya Sarkar (three) in the next over.

This was Soumya's seventh consecutive batting failure in the ongoing tournament as the southpaw could make only 45 runs at an average of 6.43.

Naseem then dismissed Mohammad Mithun (three) in his second over while Khushdil (2-24) removed in-form Nasir Hossain (17) to reduce Dhaka to 424.

Naseem also created a chance of a hat-trick by removing Muktar Ali (nine) and Amir Hamza (0) in successive deliveries when he returned to bowl his last spell. However, Taskin successfully denied him from achieving the milestone.

Dhaka’s Afghan recruit Usman Ghani made the highest 33 off 34 balls. Earlier, Comilla, which were reduced to 64-3 halfway through their innings, got a late momentum thanks to Charles, Khushdil and Jaker Ali (20 off 10 balls not out), whose meaningful contributions helped them score exactly 100 runs in the final 10 overs to post a challenging total on board.

Dhaka skipper Nasir finished with 2-19.