Asia Cup 2025: Hong Kong vs Bangladesh, Match 3 - Who Said What?

Published - 12 Sept 2025, 00:00 IST | Updated - 12 Sept 2025, 00:11 IST

Bangladesh secured a hard-fought seven-wicket win over Hong Kong in the third match of the Asia Cup 2025 on September 11 in Abu Dhabi.

Skipper Litton Das won the toss and opted to bowl first before Hong Kong suffered an early setback as opener Anshuman Rath was dismissed by Taskin Ahmed, who returned strongly after an injury layoff. Babar Hayat tried to counterattack but was undone by a brilliant delivery from Tanzim Hasan Sakib that rattled his stumps. The wicketkeeper-batter Zeeshan Ali contributed 30 before falling to a stunning catch by Mustafizur Rahman.

Nizakat Khan (42 off 40) and captain Yasim Murtaza (28 off 19) steadied the innings with a 46-run stand for the fourth wicket, guiding Hong Kong to a respectable 143/7 in 20 overs. Taskin, Sakib, and Rishad Hossain picked up two wickets each for Bangladesh.

Chasing the target, Bangladesh faced early trouble as openers Parvez Hossain Emon and Tanzid Hasan Tamim fell inside the powerplay. However, Litton (59 off 39) and Towhid Hridoy (35* off 36), stitched together a 95-run stand for the third wicket to take Bangladesh home in 17.4 overs. For Hong Kong, Ateeq Iqbal claimed two wickets.

To be honest, I am happy with the batters but would have been happier if one of them got 60-70+ and got a big total. I think we know what we need to work on, hopefully we’ll do better next time. We gave too many freebies against Afghanistan, but we came with a plan today and implemented better. Litton and the other batter though got a good partnership

It was important to win the first game. We have played some good cricket in the last two series, but the Asia Cup can be a different pressure. We played very well today. In the last few years our pace bowling department has done very well, and all we were looking for was a leg spinner and Rishad has done very well. The wicket was a bit on the slow side so we had to play carefully in the middle overs, and make the most of the big ground with the singles and doubles.