- Bangladesh 246 for 8 (Mushfiqur 65, Steyn 3-30, Duminy 3-27) drew with South Africa
The rain was not even there but it had the last say in this series. The final day of the Dhaka Test was called off before the scheduled start of play, and despite clear skies, because the outfield was deemed too waterlogged to play on. That meant four of the five days in this match were washed out and six of the 10 in the series overall, and will lead to questions over the wisdom of scheduling a series in the midst of the monsoon.
“We have never faced such a situation. If we had declared, they would have had to bat all day. There wouldn’t have been a result, but we could have earned something. (But) there are rules that have to be followed.
“Ninety per cent of the outfield was covered. It is hard to cover a ground of this size entirely. The drainage system here is as good as anywhere else in the world.
“We were really ready to play. Winning and losing, as (Mahmudullah) Riyad bhai said yesterday, is for later. We would have learned a lot by playing against the No. 1 team in the world. Such an opportunity will come next against Australia and I hope we do well against them.”
South Africa will wonder most about that. The cost of the shared spoils is five points on the Test rankings, which does not rob them of their No. 1 spot but will close the gap between them and the chasing pack, irrespective of the final outcome of the Ashes. Bangladesh gain six points and no movement on the table but would have earned some respect for their plucky performance across both games.
Things were just threatening to go awry for the hosts when the weather intervened. After a solid show for most of day one – the only day when play was possible – steered by their captain Mushfiqur Rahim, they lost 4 for 31 in the last hour. By then, Dale Steyn had found substantial reverse swing after earlier becoming the 13th bowler, and second South African, to take 400 Test wickets.
Steyn was in his 17th over when play stopped. He, and the rest of the two teams, spent the last four nights waiting for it to restart.
Heavy rain, some monsoonal, some caused by cyclone Komen, washed out days two, three and four and the aftermath made play impossible on day five. Despite the porous draining system, the outfield had taken too much rain. The umpires gauged it would take between four and five hours to dry before any action could begin, and it being the final day, decided that was impractical. Umpire Richard Kettleborough also said that the Chittagong ground drained well but Mirpur had not in the breaks between all the rain.
Some of the South Africa players, including captain Hashim Amla, stood around the pitch, bowling a bit on one of the side pitches. But curator Gamini de Silva rushed to the middle, motioning them to leave the square. Later Amla joked that they were practicing their offspin ahead of their India tour.
The Bangladesh players put up stumps as goalposts for their final football match of the season. The coaching staff and manager also joined them and slowly, the presentation ceremony and the press conferences were held.
When they were heading out for their football match an hour after the call-off, one of the Bangladesh players pointed to a teammate that they were not playing the match when the sun was blazing down.
At exactly 1:23pm, however, it rained heavily in Mirpur. The early call-off started to make sense again, at the end of what has been an impressive series for Bangladesh against a South Africa still slowly stirring from a three-month break. Bangladesh will now enjoy some time off while South Africa return home for a limited-overs series against New Zealand before a high-profile tour of India and a home series against England.
