Taylor satisfied with Zimbabwe's gains from series

Zimbabwe captain Brendan Taylor said his side's failure to start well with the bat and ball had cost them the second Twenty20 against Bangladesh. The hosts went down by 34 runs mainly due to the partnership between Shakib Al Hasan and Tamim Iqbal, and later due to the loss of two wickets during their innings in the batting Powerplay.

"They got off the mark quicker than us today," Taylor said. "They approached their batting better than us and bowled better in the first six overs. They were going at tens, we were going at sevens."

Zimbabwe had pulled off a close win in the first Twenty20 on Saturday, but were missing the same enthusiasm in the second and final game. Shakib and Tamim added 82 for the second wicket, and though Zimbabwe fought back with the ball, they batted in fits and starts during the chase and ended up losing by a big margin.

"I don't think we were relaxed. I think we didn't execute as well as we had done on Saturday [in the first Twenty20]," Taylor said. "They scored quite freely as we couldn't put the ball in the right areas. We pulled it back nicely towards the end, and we thought that 169 was very gettable. Unfortunately, we lost crucial wickets at the wrong time."

Taylor was pleased with his side's performance against Bangladesh in the Tests as well as the limited-overs games. Zimbabwe beat Bangladesh by a whopping 335 runs in the first Test and later went on to win the ODIs after losing the first game of the three-match series.

"We are very pleased with how the ODI series went. Our record in Bulawayo against Bangladesh isn't good, so we can take a lot of confidence out of that. We can also hold our heads high for drawing the T20 series.

"Our players were very hungry in this series and we needed to put up our best performance after the West Indies tour. We were determined to do well at home, where we have had good results in the past."

One of the positive outcomes for Zimbabwe was the manner in which they kept Bangladesh in check. "I think Bangladesh will be pretty disappointed, I don't think they played their best cricket," Taylor said. "We saw Shakib come good in the last game. The likes of Tamim and Mushfiqur would be pretty disappointed. They're quality players, so I am sure they'd bounce back stronger. We knew we were going to go up against a confident Bangladesh side that did well against Sri Lanka. We executed our plans really well."