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The final ODI between Zimbabwe and Bangladesh was at least a contest, but unfortunately Zim's improvement was too little, too late to prevent Bangladesh securing a series whitewash. After winning the toss & opting to field, Bangladesh once again managed to keep a lid on Zimbabwe's scoring. While there was no disastrous collapse this time around, only Masakadza (75) managed to get settled for any length of time. Zim eventually posted a score of 193/8 from their 50 overs, leaving Bangladesh requiring 3.88/over to win - not too difficult a target, on the face of it.

Bangladesh started well enough, putting on 88 for the opening partnership before Shahriar Nafees fell. That triggered something of a collapse, with Gary Brent taking 4/33 from his 10 overs and the home side slipping to 163/7 before Habibul Bashar and Saquibul Hasan steadied the ship. Tight bowling by Brent, Utseya and Ireland meant Bangladesh has to work for their runs, and only reached their target with 6 balls to spare - considerably later than they would have hoped, under the circumstances.

A much improved performance from Zimbabwe, then, but still not good enough, although publicly at least ZC don't appear to be panicing. Speaking to The Standard this weeking, ZC MD Ozias Bvute said:

"Obviously we are disappointed by the team’s overall performance. The players have not been able to acclimatise and again, there was always apprehension before the tour started that Zimbabwe would struggle against their spinners. But there will be a post-mortem when the team returns, where the technical committee will be meeting with the coaches to make a review of the tour and decide on the way forward. Whatever comes out of that meeting would then be tabled before the ZC board in early January. If there are going to be any changes, that would have to be decided by the board, after full consultation with the technical committee."

That goes against comments made by coach Kevin Curran and assisstant coach Stephen Mangongo to the Independent ahead of the match. According to Curran:

"All our top players keep making the same mistakes and we are playing wrong cricket at the wrong time. The thing is the boys have not been sticking to the basics and the senior guys must come to the party now because they are not young anymore.

The boys have to realise we haven’t got Andy Flower anymore and they simply have to perform. But then your Masakadzas, Matsikenyeris, Taylors are not doing themselves justice and they are putting me and everyone under pressure. Maybe if some of these players sit on the bench they will learn. I think the right thing now is to give the fringe players a chance or else the World Cup will be a disaster if the selectors don’t have a rethink."

Mangongo was equally blunt:

"We cannot hide behind the excuse that we are inexperienced. We must be men enough to admit our shortcomings. These boys had shown potential, but if we look at the skill factor we have gone down. If you look at batting it’s a specialised area where you are given one chance, but the so-called stars are terribly out of form.

Stu (Matsikenyeri) is still struggling with his footwork which is why he tries to go for a whack against spin while he’s stuck on the same spot. BT (Taylor) was dropped but he repeated the sane thing, fishing the ball and he was caught. Hami (Masakadza) has shown so much potential but has done little. He is not delivering and many times he’s playing irresponsible shots.

At times you go down to come up. We have to drop underachieving players because for you to learn you need competition. The World Cup is less than 100 days away and when we go back home it’s up to us to work hard one-on-one with the players. We have to look at fringe players and see what we come up with. But we are now under pressure."

First, though, there are two 'A' matches, starting Monday. Check below the cut for this match's scorecard.
Zimbabwe 193/8 (50 overs; Matsikenyeri 75, Mortaza 3/36), Bangladesh 197/7 (49 overs; Mehrab Hossain jr 45, Brent 4/22). Bangladesh win by 3 wickets, win series 5-0.
Zimbabwe Standard - ZC remain cool on team's debacle
Zimbabwe Independent - Sluggards should go, says Curran

Scorecard

Zimbabwe innings
TMK Mawoyo 	b Syed Rasel 					10
S Matsikenyeri 	c Abdur Razzak b Mehrab Hossain 		75
CJ Chibhabha 	run out (Abdur Razzak/Mushfiqur Rahim)		27
E Chigumbura 	c Mushfiqur Rahim b Mehrab Hossain 		27
SC Williams 	b Mashrafe Mortaza 				14
ML Nkala 	st Mushfiqur Rahim b Abdur Razzak 		14
KM Dabengwa 	not out 					13
GB Brent 	b Mashrafe Mortaza 				3
P Utseya 	b Mashrafe Mortaza 				2
	    Extras 	(lb 2, w 5, nb 1) 			8 					
	    Total 	(8 wickets; 50 overs) 			193 					

Did not bat: CB Mpofu, AJ Ireland

Fall of wickets: 1-28 (Mawoyo, 7.1 ov), 2-91 (Chibhabha, 24.3 ov), 
3-138 (Chigumbura, 35.2 ov), 4-153 (Matsikenyeri, 39.3 ov), 
5-167 (Williams, 42.3 ov), 6-175 (Nkala, 44.4 ov), 
7-187 (Brent, 47.6 ov), 8-193 (Utseya, 49.6 ov)

Bowling 		O 	M 	R 	W 	Econ 	
Mashrafe Mortaza 	10 	1 	36 	3 	3.60 	(1w)
Syed Rasel 		10 	1 	40 	1 	4.00 	(1nb)
Abdur Razzak 		10 	0 	27 	1 	2.70 	(1w)
Saqibul Hasan 		7 	0 	29 	0 	4.14 	(1w)
Farhad Reza 		6 	0 	29 	0 	4.83 	(1w)
Mehrab Hossain jnr 	7 	0 	30 	2 	4.28 	(1w)

							
Bangladesh innings (target: 194 runs from 50 overs)
Shahriar Nafees 	lbw b Brent 				33
Mehrab Hossain jnr 	b Brent 				45
Aftab Ahmed 		lbw b Brent 				4
Mohammad Ashraful 	b Brent 				14
Habibul Bashar 		not out 				32
Saqibul Hasan 		run out (Mawoyo/Chibhabha) 		13
Mashrafe Mortaza 	c Brent b Ireland 			0
Farhad Reza 		run out (Mpofu) 			5
Mushfiqur Rahim 	not out 				18
	    Extras 	(lb 3, w 30) 				33 					
	    Total 	(7 wickets; 49 overs) 			197 					

Did not bat: Abdur Razzak, Syed Rasel

Fall of wickets: 1-86 (Shahriar Nafees, 19.1 ov), 
2-90 (Aftab Ahmed, 19.3 ov), 3-111 (Mohammad Ashraful, 29.3 ov), 
4-114 (Mehrab Hossain, 31.5 ov), 5-140 (Saqibul Hasan, 38.2 ov), 
6-141 (Mashrafe Mortaza, 39.4 ov), 7-163 (Farhad Reza, 43.3 ov)

Bowling 	O 	M 	R 	W 	Econ 	
CB Mpofu 	8 	0 	42 	0 	5.25 	(5w)
AJ Ireland 	10 	1 	38 	1 	3.80 	(2w)
E Chigumbura 	5 	0 	35 	0 	7.00 	(7w)
GB Brent 	10 	3 	22 	4 	2.20 	(6w)
P Utseya 	10 	1 	27 	0 	2.70 	
SC Williams 	4 	0 	15 	0 	3.75 	
KM Dabengwa 	1 	0 	6 	0 	6.00 	
CJ Chibhabha 	1 	0 	9 	0 	9.00 	(2w)