The opening lines of this feature were supposed to celebrate Mushfiqur Rahim’s 13th Test century, another landmark in a career already etched deep into Bangladesh’s cricketing history. Instead, as the shadows lengthened across Mirpur at the end of day one of the second Test against Ireland, Mushfiqur walked off unbeaten on 99. The stumps call arrived just one run too soon. In the press box, writers groaned and shuffled papers, forced to abandon their crafted intros and prepare for a new angle.
All 90 overs had been bowled. Mushfiqur and Litton Das hoped for one more, but Ireland’s increasingly deliberate pace in the dying moments of the day left no room for an extra over. With the sun sinking behind the Western Stand, the umpires called time. Mushfiqur, who has accumulated 12 Test centuries across two decades, would have to wait. So would everyone else.
Mominul Haque, who shared a 107-run fourth-wicket partnership with the veteran, spoke candidly after stumps about Ireland’s time management. “Towards the end, it felt like it might happen today, but they delayed, so it did not,” he said. “I was not too worried because he is used to scoring hundreds and double hundreds. He does not panic in these situations, which gives us confidence. If it were someone else, maybe we would have been tense. But with him there, none of us panics. InshaAllah, it will happen tomorrow.”
Ireland’s slowdown was unmistakable once Mushfiqur entered the nervous nineties in the 88th over. Yet the batter himself remained completely unruffled. In a landmark Test that no other Bangladeshi man has reached, he stayed loyal to his method: building an innings ball by ball, session by session, brick by brick.
His unbeaten 99 was a reminder of why he is admired as one of Bangladesh’s finest Test cricketers. He arrived with the scoreboard reading 95 for 3, the early promise from Mahmudul Hasan Joy and Shadman Islam undone by Andy McBrine, who claimed all four wickets to fall. The situation was delicate, but Mushfiqur has spent his life walking into precarious positions and restoring control. He did the same again, resisting pressure, nullifying movement and outlasting the bowlers.
Spectators hoping for fireworks would have been left wanting. Mushfiqur has never been one for theatrics. His cricket is rooted in grit, patience and pure technique. Batting in his trusted number five slot, he faced 187 deliveries, struck only five boundaries and accumulated the rest of his runs through tireless rotation of strike. His trademark flick was his most productive shot of the day, executed with the usual precision. He did not offer even a half-chance.
As he prepares to take strike on the first ball of day two, Mushfiqur stands one run short of becoming the 12th batter in history to score a century in their 100th Test and the first from Bangladesh to achieve the feat. Whenever that moment arrives, the celebrations will follow, but nothing about his approach will change.
For all the milestones and the history surrounding him, he remains the same Mushfiqur Rahim. Calm. Gritty. Astute. The boy who debuted at Lord’s in 2005 has become the standard-bearer of Bangladesh’s Test identity. And with every innings like this one, he keeps teaching the next generation what it truly means to play Test cricket the Mushfiqur way.
