AFG vs BAN, Only Test — Day 4 Stumps: Bangladesh Declare on 372/7, Afghanistan 132/3 Chasing 479 After Litton Das's Hundred

Litton Das began the fourth day on 5 not out with the match already in Bangladesh's hands, and spent the morning deciding how firmly to close them. By lunch he had 81, by early afternoon a hundred off 115 balls, and when Mohammad Saleem finally had him caught behind for 102, Bangladesh declared at 372 for 7. Afghanistan were asked to make 479, or to bat out the better part of five sessions.

They got through the first two of those sessions at a cost of three wickets. Abdul Malik and Shahidullah were gone inside seven overs, Rahmat Shah and Sediqullah Atal then added 82 in 214 balls, and Ebadot Hossain's late removal of Rahmat for 51 left Afghanistan 132 for 3 at stumps. The deficit is 346. The target, in truth, is the clock.

Bangladesh resumed at 223 for 6 with a lead of 329, and the question was whether Litton Das and Mehidy Hasan Miraz would bat for an hour or a session. They batted the whole of it. Afghanistan took the new ball at 80.3 overs, and the pair treated it as an invitation: the seventh-wicket stand reached fifty off 72 balls, Litton contributing 39 of them, and he reached his own fifty off 61 balls with seven fours. At drinks Bangladesh were 285 for 6, Litton 52 and Mehidy 15.

The 300 came up in the 89th over, the stand went past 100 off 135 balls, and at lunch Bangladesh were 337 for 6 — 114 runs added in 26 overs without a wicket falling. Litton was 81, Mehidy 38, and the lead had grown to 443. Afghanistan used seven bowlers across the innings, Hashmatullah Shahidi and Abdul Malik included, and none of them found a way through.

Mehidy reached fifty off 92 balls soon after the interval, and Litton went to his hundred off 115 balls with 14 fours — his first-innings 53 had been patient; this was the opposite. Two balls later Saleem had him caught behind by Ikram Alikhil for 102, the stand ending at 149 off 201 balls, and Bangladesh declared at 372 for 7. Mehidy was left unbeaten on 52 off 97. The target was 479.

Ebadot Hossain needed seven balls to strike: Abdul Malik caught behind by Litton for 2 at 3 for 1. Shahidullah came in and hit four boundaries in 19 balls, then edged Hasan Mahmud to Litton for 19 at 28 for 2 in the seventh over, and Afghanistan's review was struck down. That was drinks. Sediqullah Atal and Rahmat Shah took Afghanistan to fifty in the 14th over and to tea at 51 for 2, both on 14.

The final session was the one Afghanistan needed to get right, and for most of it they did. The third-wicket pair reached fifty off 127 balls, Rahmat making 34 of them, and Afghanistan were 79 for 2 at drinks and past 100 in the 40th over. Rahmat reached fifty off 121 balls with five fours and a six, a slower, more guarded version of the man who made 105 not out in the first innings.

He added one more run. Ebadot, brought back in the 43rd over, had him caught behind for 51 off 124 balls at 110 for 3, and Litton Das had his third catch of the innings. Hashmatullah Shahidi came in and, with Atal, saw out the remaining eight overs without further loss. Afghanistan closed at 132 for 3 after 50 overs, Atal 35 not out and Shahidi 19 not out. The session had cost them one wicket for 81 runs in 35 overs — the right shape, just one wicket too many.

There is a particular kind of innings a wicketkeeper plays when the match is safe and the lead needs converting into time, and Litton Das played it with a clarity that was lovely to watch. He had made 53 off 89 in the first innings, grinding out a 62-run stand with Mehidy that ended at 287 for 6. In the second he scored 102 off 117, with 14 fours and no sixes, and the strike rate of 87 was a choice rather than a mood: Bangladesh wanted the runs in before lunch, and he got most of them there.

Then he put the gloves on and took three catches — Abdul Malik, Shahidullah, Rahmat Shah — to add to the four catches and a stumping he collected in Afghanistan's first innings. Eight dismissals and 155 runs in a Test match, with a day still to go, is the sort of all-round contribution a side builds a win around.

Afghanistan's attack finished the second innings with figures that tell their own story: Zia-ur-Rehman 33-4-86-2, Yamin Ahmadzai 20-2-96-2, Saleem 19.2-3-69-2, Qais Ahmad 15-0-70-1, Shahidi 12-0-32-0. Ismat Alam, who took 2 for 20 in 12.4 miserly overs in the first innings, bowled only three overs in the second. Without him as a holding bowler, there was no one to apply pressure from one end while another attacked, and Bangladesh's lower order cashed in.

The batting on this fourth evening was better than the bowling. Rahmat and Atal batted 214 balls together, the scoring rate stayed below three an over, and the shots Shahidullah played early were not repeated. Afghanistan did what a side in their position must do: they refused to think about 479.

This Test didn't have a CricIntel preview, so there is no prediction to grade. We have followed it from the first day's stumps, and we'll close it out tomorrow with a full result review.

Afghanistan need 347 more runs with seven wickets left, and nobody on either side will be thinking in those terms. The real equation is wickets against overs: a full day's play, a 50-over-old ball that will be replaced after the 80th over, and a Bangladesh attack in which Ebadot Hossain and Hasan Mahmud have taken 12 of the 13 Afghan wickets so far. Sediqullah Atal and Hashmatullah Shahidi resume, Ikram Alikhil — who faced 103 balls for 32 in the first innings — is next, and after him the tail that Hasan Mahmud ran through in three balls on Day 3. Afghanistan have one man with a hundred in this match already, and he is back in the pavilion. They will need another.