Birthday special: Mahmudullah – One of the strongest pillars of Bangladesh cricket
Mahmudullah Riyad, born on 4th February 1986, is one of the most prominent Bangladeshi cricketers for the past decade. Having made his debut for the national side in 2007, it took him some years to make himself a settled player in the team. But over the years, as Bangladesh have become stronger and stronger as a force in international cricket, Mahmudullah has been at the core of most of those developments. He currently is the T20I captain of the Bangladesh team and has worked quite hard to reach this position.
When Mahmudullah broke out on the scene, he was a terrific all-rounder who could contribute with the ball and the bat regularly. However, with time, he has focussed much more on batting and tried to improve that aspect of his game. Initially, he used to bat lower down the order, but with time, he has batted in almost all positions. Whenever the team needed him to bat in the top order, he did, and then slowly moved back to the middle or lower-middle order.
Career highlights
In the 2011 Cricket World Cup, Mahmudullah played a crucial knock of 21 against England in a group stage match which helped his side beat the Englishmen. Four years later, he was once again out there against England in a World Cup 2015 match. He scored a century batting at no.3, which was also the first century by any Bangladeshi player at any World Cup. The century also allowed his team to knock England out of the tournament and help Bangladesh reach the quarter-finals of a World Cup for the first time. A few days later, he smashed another century, this time against co-hosts New Zealand. Those two knocks will go down as two of the best by Bangladesh batsmen.
Happy birthday to Bangladesh’s man for the big stage, Mahmudullah ??
Relive all three of his ICC World Cup and Champions Trophy hundreds ? pic.twitter.com/KO97CoRaYZ
— ICC (@ICC) February 4, 2021
Post-2015 World Cup, the perception of the Bangladesh team had changed. They were now dominating top teams at home and also giving them tough competition overseas. Mahmudullah also played a key role in Bangladesh qualifying for the semi-finals for the first time in a World event. At the 2017 Champions Trophy, he partnered with Shakib Al Hasan in a match-winning partnership which helped their side to beat the Blackcaps and qualify for the semis. He scored an unbeaten 102 to help Bangladesh chase down a tricky total at Cardiff.
So far in his 13 years of career, Mahmudullah has played 49 Tests scoring 2764 runs at an average of 31.41. In 191 ODI matches, he has aggregated 4143 runs at an average of 34.24. He also has 1474 T20I runs in 87 matches. He has been quite a handy bowler as well. He has picked up 43, 76 and 31 wickets in Tests, ODIs and T20I respectively.
Along with Shakib, Mushfiqur Rahim, Tamim Iqbal and Mashrafe Mortaza, Mahmudullah will go down as one of the finest players to have come out of Bangladesh. He has been one of the pillars of the national team and has been there through thick and thin over several years.
