Tamim inspires Bangladesh World Twenty20 win

Tamim Iqbal made an unbeaten 83 from only 58 balls as Bangladesh started their World Twenty20 campaign with an eight-run victory over Netherlands in Dharamsala??on Wednesday.

The Tigers,??favourites to win Group A and progress to the Super 10 stage,??were indebted to opening batsman??Tamim for avoiding an upset on the second day of the tournament.

Tamim scored the third-highest total by a??Bangladesh batsman in a T20 and was just five short of equalling the record he holds when the innings closed on 153-7.

Stephan Myburgh and??Peter Borren scored 29 apiece, but the Dutch - who beat England in the World T20 two years ago??-??fell short on 145-7 after threatening a surprise win.

Bangladesh came into the tournament full of confidence after they were runners-up to India??in the Asia Cup on home soil, but would have been in all kinds of trouble had Tamim not held the innings together.

The dangerous left-hander smashed three sixes and hit a further six boundaries as wickets tumbled around him, with??Soumya Sarkar and??Sabbir Rahman the next highest scores despite making only 15.

Timm van der Gugten (3-21) was the pick of the Netherlands bowlers, but they came up short with the bat as??Al-Amin Hossain (2-24) and Shakib Al Hasan (2-28) did the bulk of the damage in the absence of??Mustafizur Rahman due to a side strain.??

Netherlands needed 17 to win off the last over, but some impressive death bowling from??Taskin Ahmed denied them.