Heart-warming to see Bangladesh make an excellent start against the Aussies - as I write this, they are
208/1 off just 45 overs (rr: 4.6). Such a start would be considered exceptional even for established sides like India and England; for Bangladesh, it is nothing short of phenomenal and regardless of what happens for the rest of the series (a serious drubbing, in all probability), they can and should take heart from this morning.
20 year old
Shahriar Nafis has just reaches his first Test century (or first in
any form of the game!) in only his fifth Test- what a day to reach that special milestone. And what a way to reach it too - successive boundaries off Warne! In fact, Warne's figures should delight cricket lovers everywhere (well, everywhere but Australia
) - 11 overs, no maidens, 73 runs, no wickets - being hammered for almost 7 an over by the weakest Test team around!
This is actually the first time Warne is playing Bangladesh - now we know why he has been avoiding them all this while!
In fact, this mauling is reminiscent (albeit on a much smaller scale) of the ones Warne has regularly received on a few previous visits to the sub-continent, notably from Salim Malik in 1994 and Tendulkar & Co on quite a few occasions since - they have succeeded by treating Warne not on reputation but on actual performance, and playing him as a leg-spinner who does not spin the leggie as much as most other leg-spinners do, and does not even have a noticeable wrong 'un.
Sure, he may go on to take 20 wickets in the two Tests here and Australia may wrap up the series inside five days; such has been their sustained dominance of all teams that one cannot rule that out - but so far, things are looking very positive indeed
