The 37th match of the ongoing ICC Men's T20 World Cup witnessed scorching heat in the middle of the pitch as Bangladesh's emerging speedster Tanzim Hasan Sakib and Nepal's captain Rohit Paudel got involved in a heated war of words.
Tanzim had his tail up after getting rid of Anil Sah and Kushal Bhurtel. He bowled a good length ball outside off which was cautiously negotiated by Paudel to end the third over.
But rather than going back to his field position Tanzim got involved in a staredown with Paudel. The situation worsened as they got perilously close to each other and engaged in a verbal volley.
Litton Das and Aasif Sheikh had to intervene to separate both players and the two on-field umpires Sam Nogajski and Ahsan Raza got involved soon to pacify the brawl.
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Tanzim had the last laugh as he got rid of Paudel on the second delivery of the fifth over. It was a half-tracker but instead of hammering it for a boundary, Paudel just managed to hit it straight down to Rishad Hossain's throat at backward point.
The Nepal captain was furious with himself but had to trudge off the field in despair.
Tanzim was adjudged the Player of the Match (POTM) for his spectacular bowling spell. During the post-match presentation, Tanzim revealed that they had enough runs on the board and just wanted to launch an all-out attack on Nepal's batting order to win the match.
"We just wanted to keep things simple. We wanted to bowl in good areas and did not want to panic. We knew we could defend this score," said Tanzim. "Everybody bowled well. As a bowling attack, we bowled well and that is why we defended the score. I just want to be aggressive and execute my plans. We are really excited for the Super Eight. We are very confident about it and hopefully (we can do well). Spin-bowling was tough, and it was not easy to get those runs. We held our lines and lengths, and it worked."
