At the beginning of the bowling, there was pressure not to take wickets, and at the beginning of the batting, they lost 3 wickets quickly. However, the end was good in both departments. And 'whoever is good at the end, is good at everything' proved that Bangladesh's victory smile at the end of the day.

Bangladesh surpassed Afghanistan's 147 runs for 5 wickets yesterday with 2 wickets and 5 balls in hand. This 2-wicket victory at the Sharjah International Stadium also gave Bangladesh a series win against Afghanistan. The third and final T20 of the series, which has become a formality, is tomorrow.

Bangladesh's victory was confirmed by Shariful Islam's four in the first ball of the 20th over. At the other end, Nurul Hasan remained unbeaten on 31 runs for his second consecutive victory. However, after 18 overs, the Bangladesh team was under pressure. With only 2 wickets in hand, they needed 19 runs in the last 12 balls.

Standing in that situation, Nurul and Shariful took 17 runs from the 19th over bowled by Nur Ahmed. Where Nurul contributed 7 off 2 balls, Shariful 7 off 4 balls, and the remaining 3 were extra wickets.

Earlier, the fourth wicket partnership of Zaker Ali and Shamim Hossain laid the foundation for Bangladesh's victory. The opening partnership of Tanjid Hasan and Parvez Hossain had scored 109 runs in the previous match, but this time both were out within 16 runs. Saif Hasan, who indicated a stormy batting with 2 sixes, also returned, keeping the team at 24 runs. Then, the fifty-plus partnership of Zaker and Shamim kept the team on the path to victory.

The 56-run partnership was broken by Rashid Khan's ball in 37 balls when Zaker Ali was LBW. Zaker, who had been out in single figures in 4 consecutive innings, scored 33 runs off 25 balls with 3 fours and 2 sixes. Another drought has ended for him - he hit a six after 7 innings and 86 balls in international T20s.

Shamim also could not make his innings much bigger after that. He was caught by Nur for 33 runs off 22 balls. After the departure of both of them, the match changed dramatically. Bangladesh came under pressure again. They lost 4 wickets with a difference of 27 runs from 102 to 129.

Mohammad Saifuddin and Rishad Hossain both returned with a difference of 2 balls off Azmatullah Omarzai. Nurul took control of the newly accumulated drama at that stage. He hit 3 sixes and 1 four in his 21-ball innings.

Shariful, who accompanied Nurul towards the end, was also excellent with the ball. He gave away only 9 runs in his first 3 overs. Although Bangladesh could not take any wickets from Afghanistan in the powerplay.

The good thing was that the two openers of Afghanistan were stuck at 35 runs in 6 overs. Later, Rishad Hossain and Nasum Ahmed started to turn Bangladesh around from there. Both took 2 wickets each. Apart from that, Mohammad Saifuddin did not get a wicket but gave away only 22 runs in 4 overs.

In the death over, when Shariful bowled Rahmanullah Gurbaz with a superb yorker, Afghanistan's chances of reaching 150 were dashed. Gurbaz scored the second highest score of 30 runs in 22 balls before being dismissed. Opening batsman Ibrahim Zadran scored 38 in 37 balls. This was not enough to stop the Bangladesh batsmen.

Shariful was named man of the match for his unbeaten innings of 1 wicket for 13 runs in 4 overs with the ball and 11 runs in 7 balls with the bat. This is Bangladesh's third consecutive win against Afghanistan. Bangladesh also won the group stage of the Asia Cup last month before the first two matches of the ongoing series. Now the scoreline of the two teams' 15-match head-to-head matches is Bangladesh 8, Afghanistan 7.