SYLHET, March 4, 2020 (BSS) – Opener Tamim Iqbal believes his 158, the highest individual ODI score by a Bangladeshi batsman, will be broken very soon as he singled out the name of Mushfiqur Rahim, Liton and Nazmul Hossain Shanto, who can snatch the record from him.
“I don’t think the record will last long. I believe it will be broken very soon, may be next year or may be within two or three years,” he said.
“Mushfiqur Rahim is more than capable. There is Liton Das who is also capable. Nazmul Hossain Shanto often played big knock. He also can do this,” he added.
Tamim is the only Bangladeshi batsman to hit two 150 plus knock, first of which a 154 came also against Zimbabwe in 2009 at Bulawayo when Bangladesh chased 313 to win the game.
Tamim rated his 154 as his best, considering that score came in chase of a mammoth total.
“That was the first time we chased 300 to win a game. So this 154 knock is ahead of the 158. During that period, nobody can imagine that 300 runs will be chase-able. These time chasing 300 is easier but 2009’s 300 is equivalent to 400 this time.”
The southpaw however said that 200 was not in his mind when he completed 150 runs. “I didn’t think so. I was still 50 runs away of 200. If I was just away of 20/30 runs, I could say I thought of 200,” he remarked.
“What I thought was that the wicket gets better in the second innings, so my intention was to score as quickly as possible. In the first innings, batting is bit tougher because there is uneven bounce. We were in fact one batsman short. So I thought I would have to take the onus to score quickly. Unfortunately I got out a delivery in which I didn’t get that elevation.”