Academy look set to give Bangladesh a run chase

Bangladesh will get a chance to show their ability to score runs in a chase situation on the final day of their match against the Commonwealth Bank Academy XI at Brisbane tomorrow.

At stumps on day two at Allan Border Field, the Academy XI led by 125 runs with six wickets remaining in their second innings.

They were 99 for 4 wickets at stumps with Aaron Nye 27 not out. The Australian Academy side lost Simon Williams when the score was 14, and then Scott Meuleman (29) and Peter Worthington (4) were out within three overs of each other. At 45 for 3, the Academy needed to rebuild and it was Nye who led the way. He batted for 105 minutes to reach stumps and will be a key player as the Australians look to set Bangladesh a competitive chase tomorrow.

Mashrafe Mortaza picked up two wickets for 19 while Mohammad Rafique could prove a handful on the last day with his left-arm spin bowling. His six overs today resulted in one wicket for seven runs. However, the Australians have not yet batted their first innings success stories, Matthew Innes and Rhett Lockyear.

Earlier, Habibul Bashar and Javed Omar made a fine start to the second day when resuming Bangladesh's first innings. They added 146 runs for the second wicket in sensible batting which offered hope that Bangladesh might be able to get into a position where they were not playing catch-up cricket. Omar was first to go, for 59, having batted for 213 minutes, He was caught by Chris Duval from Aaron Nye's bowling.

And that dismissal had the effect of setting in train a mini-collapse as four runs later Bashar was out, one short of what would have been a deserved century having batted 188 minutes and facing 146 balls. He was bowled by fast-medium bowler Mark Cleary.

Further problems came for Bangladesh when Mohammad Ashraful was bowled without any addition to the score. Sanwar Hossain and Alok Kapali then staunched the flow of wickets in a sensible stand spread over half an hour before Callum Ferguson provided a double breakthrough. He had Kapali caught by Luke Ronchi for 14 and then Hossain's 63-minute innings ended for 26 when he was bowled by Ferguson.

Bangladesh were 220 for 6 at that stage. They declared at 232 for 7, 26 runs behind the Academy side for whom Ferguson ended with 2 for 5 from his five overs.