Gayle stalls, Simmons walks

Where was Chris Gayle? He was not out there batting at the Shere Bangla Stadium at least. The tall, clumsy left-hander who came out in his place took 46 deliveries to nudge his strike-rate past run-a-ball. By that time, nearly 18 overs had gone by. Two balls later, he was out to a spectacular catch, to end with 48 off 48. Had Gayle been watching, he would not have approved of it.

West Indies kept stalling and Bangladesh kept providing them release. In the 17th over, Marlon Samuels missed a full and wide one from Shakib Al Hasan which also evaded Mushfiqur Rahim, who let it race for four byes through his legs. Shakib turned around in anguish, but it was to get worse next ball. Samuels swung and missed a low full toss this time outside off, and so did Mushfiqur, failing to get his gloves down or pads together in time.

Bangladesh continued showering gifts on West Indies. Darren Sammy swung Ziaur Rahman very high and straight in the 19th over. Mahmudullah settled under it at long-off. It came in over his head, and zipped through his wrists into the boundary. Sammy lofted the next one inside-out to Mahmudullah's left. He ran a few steps, leaned further to his left, got both hands to the ball, let it slip through again, and it rolled into the rope for four more.

Amid all the shoddy fielding and catching going around, Denesh Ramdin pulled off a sharp stumping, standing up to a seamer. Anamul Haque missed one going across him from Krishmar Santokie, and his momentum took him just outside the crease for an instant. That was enough for Ramdin, who had gathered the ball without much of a follow-through, to remove the bails.

Al-Amin Hossain has apparently avoided high catches in Bangladesh's training sessions because he is shy to drop them after dropping one during the Asia Cup. So when finally a catch went up in the 12th over, all eyes were on short fine-leg running in and telling the wicketkeeper to go away as he lined up the Dwayne Smith skier. The fielder was Al-Amin and as the ball thumped into his grasp, he almost gave it away, and then needed a second attempt to keep the ball in his clutch. And to think that he asked the wicketkeeper, the one with big gloves, to go away.

Lendl Simmons saw Shakib's slider go past his bat and pad. Exactly why he sprang out of his crease at that point is hard to understand as Mushfiqur whipped the bails off. He has the third batsman to be stumped first ball off a wide, so registering as out without facing, in T20Is. The previous two were also West Indians: Kieron Pollard and Narsingh Deonarine.

Tamim Iqbal is usually found at mid-on or mid-off, or the corresponding fielding positions outside and inside the circle. While not many catches go his way, Tamim made two half chances into catches in this game. Chris Gayle hit one towards him in the penultimate over, for which Tamim had to peddle back and then as soon as he had the ball in his grasp, let it go, jump into the playing area and catch it again. These catches are quite regular around cricket these days, but Bangladeshi fielders have been poor when judging between the boundary rope and the incoming high ball.