Zimbabwe v Bangladesh, 2nd ODI, Harare

Utseya impressed with young side

Warren Carne

February 7, 2007

Sibanda was outstanding - Utseya © AFP

Utseya believes his side are now in an excellent position to overcome their main rivals in the remaining matches after breaking their losing run of 14 games.

He made special mention of the two match-winners Vusi Sibanda, who hit an unbeaten 93, and seamer Gary Brent who took four wickets. "That was a very big morale booster for the side and we must keep our guns blazing for the remaining games, we cannot afford to relax," said Utseya. "Sibanda was outstanding today, as was Brent. But it was essentially an all-round team effort.

"Vusi played well up-front, and that is something that has been lacking in our side in the past few games, and it is good that we have our confidence back.

"We lost the first game but we came back strongly, showed character and did our homework to correct our mistakes of the past. The trick to winning was that we just stuck to the basics."

Habibul Bashar rued his side's batting collapse to 153, which left the bowlers with too much to do. "We did not play well enough today and that is why we lost the game. We lost too many wickets in the early stages of the match, we tried all we could but in the end a score of 153 was never going to be enough on that kind of a wicket.

"Zimbabwe did well in their bowling today and it is now up to us to do our best in the next game to get a win. We needed to take wickets and get more runs on the board, which today we failed to do."

© Cricinfo

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Matches

Zimbabwe v Bangladesh at Harare

Players/Umpires

Habibul Bashar

Prosper Utseya

Series/Tournaments

Bangladesh tour of Zimbabwe

Teams

Bangladesh

Zimbabwe