Bangladesh completed a hat-trick of victories in Plate Championship Group 2 of the Under-19 World Cup with an eight wicket demolition of Ireland at the Chittagong Divisional Stadium on Friday.
Both sides were already through to the semi-finals before today's match but the prize for the winners was a match against Scotland while the losers knew they would have to take on Australia.
Ireland opted to bat first in the knowledge that Bangladesh have stuttered when chasing small totals against Canada and Uganda.
But Ireland were unable to set a challenging target as Bangladesh's bowlers had a third consecutive good performance. Ireland were all out for 141 in the 47th over with left-arm seamer Nadif Chowdhury the pick of the bowlers with 4 for 14.
This time Bangladesh's batsmen made few mistakes in their reply. Opener Nafees Iqbal at last found form with the bat, hitting 86 not out to guide the hosts to victory for the loss of only two wickets in 30 overs.
Iqbal was named man of the match and was pleased to have made some runs for his team.
"It is not about scoring centuries, it is all about winning the match for the team. It was just important today that we won the match," said Iqbal.
Ireland coach Adrian Birrell singled out Iqbal for his batting performance.
"All credit to Nafees for a very good innings, he batted very well against us," said Birrell.
"I'm not too disappointed with our performance, we just came up against a better team on the day. We will now turn our efforts towards beating Australia and hopefully we may even meet Bangladesh in the final."
