Sports: Mehidy Hasan Miraz has single-handedly kept Bangladesh alive in the ongoing first Test against South Africa. He has scored a fighting half-century in the second innings after the team was on the brink of an innings defeat on the third day of the Test match in Dhaka. With this knock, Mehidy has also created a special record in the ongoing World Test Championship cycle showcasing his all-round skills yet again for Bangladesh.

Interestingly, the 26-year-old is the highest run-scorer and wicket-taker for Bangladesh in this WTC cycle having amassed 512 runs in 16 innings at an average of 42.66 with five fifties and picking up 34 wickets. He is only the third player in WTC history to score more than 500 runs and pick more than 30 wickets in a single WTC edition.

Ravindra Jadeja and Ben Stokes are the other players who achieved this double. The current England Test captain has done it twice. He scored 1334 runs and picked 34 wickets in the inaugural WTC cycle (2019-21) and then mustered 971 runs and accounted for 30 wickets in the second WTC edition (2021-23). Jadeja scored 721 runs and picked 47 wickets in the WTC cycle spanning from 2021-23.

As far as the Test match is concerned, South Africa are having the upper hand now. The visitors bundled out Bangladesh on the opening day for just 106 runs and then took a huge lead of 202 runs on the back of a century from Kyle Verreynne. In their second essay, Bangladesh collapsed again and were struggling at 112/6 staring at an innings defeat. But Mehidy Hasan joined hands with Jaker Ali to put up a brilliant partnership and help the hosts gain a lead. However, Bangladesh will need a lot more runs from the duo to somehow turn this game on its head.