Pacer Shoriful Islam struck a hat-trick as Durdanto Dhaka kept Cumilla Victorians below 150 runs in the opening game of the Bangladesh Premier League (BPL).
The defending champions managed to post 143 runs facing 20 overs losing six wickets at the Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium in Mirpur on Friday.
Being asked to bat, Cumilla started being a little bit slow and lost opener Liton Das, 13, on 23 runs. But it was Imrul Kayes, 66, who stood before Dhaka's strong bowling line-up and made a huge 107-run stand with Towhid Hridoy, 47, in the second wicket.
However, once the partnership was broken, the flow of runs became sluggish and they kept losing wickets till the end, thanks to Shorful's three wickets in the last three balls of the innings.
Apart from Shoriful, Taskin Ahmed and Chaturanga de Silva bagged two and one wickets respectively.
Playing XIs
Durdanto Dhaka: Mohammad Naim, Danushka Gunathilaka, Chaturanga de Silva, Lasith Croospulle, Irfan Sukkur (wk), Mosaddek Hossain (c), Saif Hassan, Taskin Ahmed, Arafat Sunny, Shoriful Islam, Usman Qadir.
Cumilla Victorians: Litton Das (c & wk), Imrul Kayes, Towhid Hridoy, Jaker Ali, Mahidul Islam Ankon, Khushdil Shah, Roston Chase, Tanvir Islam, Mustafizur Rahman, Matthew Forde, Musfik Hasan.
EM
