Read the detailed match report of the Fortune Barisal vs Rangpur Riders

Read the detailed match report of the Fortune Barisal vs Rangpur Riders

Fortune Barisal and Rangpur Riders are the two teams that can be identified as big teams in this year's BPL on paper and pen. But their first meeting in the tournament did not exactly resemble a big team fight. In today's second match at the Mirpur Sher-e-Bangla Stadium, the 2017 champions Rangpur Riders defeated the reigning champions Fortune Barisal by 8 wickets and won one-sidedly.

Towards the end of the match, which was played in the bitter cold, the Mirpur Sher-e-Bangla Stadium was almost covered in fog. The middle-wicket seemed very blurry from the press box. In the meantime, Rangpur won the match with 5 overs to spare.

Despite losing 2 wickets for 15 runs, opener Alex Hales and Saif Hasan, who got out for four, ended the game. They shared an unbroken partnership of 113 runs for the third wicket. Hales, who hit a six off Fahim Ashraf's ball to win the match, was unbeaten on 49 off 41 balls and Saif was unbeaten on 62 off 46 balls. Another bad news for Fortune Barisal along with the loss could have been Mushfiqur Rahim's left hand injury while wicketkeeping. After the match, coach Mizanur Rahman described it as 'not serious'.

After losing the toss and opting to bat, Fortune Barisal opener and captain Tamim Iqbal took 10 runs off a four and a six in the first over of Kamrul Islam. But that initial storm quickly died down. Tamim eventually scored 28 runs off 18 balls, but before that, another opener Nazmul Hossain and Towhid Hridoy departed. After Tamim's dismissal, Fortune Barisal completely lost their way. The last 9 wickets, including Hridoy and Tamim, fell by a margin of 82 runs.

There is no reason to think that the sporting wicket in Mirpur has suddenly become bowling-friendly. Rather, like the first two days and today's first match, batting in this match was not very difficult. It was actually Fortune Barisal batsmen who made it difficult by playing bad shots. Rangpur's Khushdil Shah took 3 wickets for 18 runs and Iftekhar Ahmed took 10 wickets and Nahid Rana took 2 wickets each for 32 runs.

Brief scores:

Fortune Barisal: 124 in 18.2 overs (Tamim 28, Nabi 21, Mushfiqur 15, Myers 13; Khushdil 3/18, Iftekhar 2/10, Rana 2/32).

Rangpur Riders: 128/2 in 15 overs (Saif 62*, Hales 49*; Emon 2/41).

Result: Rangpur Riders won by 8 wickets.

Man of the Match: Saif Hasan.