Tanzid’s maiden hundred puts Bangladesh in front in Darwin, 23 years after their last visit
Bangladesh lost inside three days the last time they played a Test at Marrara. On the second day of their return they batted Australia’s 198 into the distance.
Aug 14, 2026
Twenty-three years ago Bangladesh came to Marrara Oval in Darwin, lost by an innings and 132 runs in three days, and did not come back. They returned this week. On Friday they spent most of the day batting Australia out of the contest.
Tanzid Hasan made 101 in his second Test match, a 197-ball innings with eight fours and a six that turned a promising position into a lead. Bangladesh went past Australia’s first-innings 198 in the afternoon and by the evening session had stretched the advantage beyond 120.
Australia’s one consolation arrived with the second new ball, which brought three wickets in a short burst. Najmul Hossain Shanto edged Josh Hazlewood to Steven Smith at slip for 84 from 126 balls. Mushfiqur Rahim went the same way for 36, caught by Smith again off Pat Cummins. It stopped the bleeding. It did not reverse anything.
Only the second Bangladeshi to do it against Australia
Tanzid is now the second batter from his country to score a Test hundred against Australia. The first was Shahriar Nafees, who made 138 at Fatullah in 2006 and has since worked with Tanzid on his batting, which is the kind of neat line that usually gets invented after the fact. This one is true.
He did not last long after reaching the milestone. One over later he went after Nathan Lyon, found the long-off boundary occupied and picked out Mitchell Starc, who took a tumbling catch. Before that he had put on 102 for the second wicket with Mominul Haque and 93 for the third with Shanto, which is where this innings was really built.
Australia have not been able to bat
The context for all of this is what Australia did on day one, which was 198 all out. Hasan Mahmud took 6 for 55, the best figures of his career. Smith top-edged him to Litton Das for 71 and nobody else got going.
Bangladesh had made 54 in a warm-up game at the same venue five days earlier, which tells you how little anyone saw this coming. Australia’s own pace attack of Starc, Hazlewood and Cummins is fully assembled. It has not been the problem. The batting has.
The history this is being measured against
Bangladesh have beaten Australia in a Test once, in Dhaka in 2017, by 20 runs, with Shakib Al Hasan taking 5 for 85. That is the entire list. Their previous tour of Australia, in 2003, produced defeats by an innings and 132 runs in Darwin and an innings and 98 runs in Cairns, and no Test series here since.
Australia’s real problem is their record once they have conceded a lead like this. ESPNcricinfo’s statisticians pointed out during the day that the last time Australia overturned a first-innings deficit of 100 or more to win a men’s Test was against Pakistan at Sydney in 2010. They have conceded plenty of similarly large deficits since without repeating the feat.
None of which is won yet. A first-innings lead on day two is not a result, and Australia still have two innings to bat with a top order that has been a great deal better than this. But Bangladesh have already made this a contest, which was not the expectation when the fixture was announced, and both Tests count towards the World Test Championship. The second starts in Mackay on 22 August.