Thus Ernest Bramah, an enterprising purveyor of Edwardiana. The Kai Lung books have little to do with any version of China recognisable by historians, but he did have a fine turn of phrase. It seemed an apposite description of tonight’s match in Colombo. Pakistan won the toss on a good wicket and batted. Their opponents? Bangla Desh, who are only at this World Cup at all after narrowly defeating the once mighty West Indies in the qualifying rounds. If Pakistan expected an easy win they were in for a rude awakening. Marufa Akter is the Bangla side’s only seamer. But her opening over rattled through Omaima and Sidra. 2/2 was hardly the start they had expected. Marufa swung the new ball at a good pace and demanded exaggerated respect.
The remainder of the Bangla attack was spin, spin, and yet more spin. Their five-fold battery tied up the Pakistani batsmen into Turks’ head knots. They had no answers, and were bowled out in the 39th over for a pitiable 129. All the spinners took wickets, and Shorna Akter finished with the absurd figures of 3/5. The much-decorated Diana Baig, batting at no.9, was left unbeaten and untroubled on 16. Not for the first time, she must wonder why she is not sent in earlier. During Diana’s opening spell the target of 130 looked a long way off. She is a multi-talented athlete who has also represented Pakistan at soccer, and has carried their attack for more years than she probably cares to remember. Five overs in the power-play yielded her figures of 1/2. Most of the dot balls were from plays and misses. Had she beaten the bat any more often she could justly have demanded forfeits from the hapless batsmen.
Fatima Sana beat the bat almost as often. And yet the Bangla women stood their ground and refused to throw their hands away as Pakistan had done. Their batting has long been fragile, and relies heavily on their captain Nigar Sultana Joty. When Joty came out at no.4 she took her time to play herself in. She also took time out to reassure her partner Rubya Haider Jhilik, who had batted through from the outset and clung to the crease like a short-sighted limpet. The substance of their talks was self-evident. No, this is not Galle, where the ball turns square. Let’s take these spinners on now, and belt them out of the attack. And they did, forcing the recall of Diana and Fatima. Fatima accounted for Joty, but the game was gone by then. Victory was achieved with nineteen overs and seven wickets to spare, with Jhilik unbeaten on 54. Minnows in world cricket, are we? We’ll see about that.