What happened when Bangladesh took on Hong Kong the only time in T20Is previously?

The 2025 edition of the Men’s T20 Asia Cup is slowly heating up with Afghanistan and India winning their respective first games. Bangladesh take on Hong Kong, China in the Group B clash on Thursday, September 11 at the Sheikh Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi and will be keen to get their campaign off to a good start. This will be only the second time both teams would lock horns in T20Is, with the first one surprisingly being won by Hong Kong, back in 2014, in a T20 World Cup encounter and on Bangladesh’s own soil.

Bizarre is a word that might come to mind, but yes, it was one of the upsets of the fifth edition of the World T20 and Hong Kong managed to screech past the hosts in a low-scoring thriller in Chattogram. Put in to bat first, Bangladesh didn’t get off to the best of starts, losing experienced Tamim Iqbal on the second delivery of the innings. Anamul Haque and Shakib Al Hasan did the firefighting job to help Bangladesh recover from early blows.

The partnership lasted until the powerplay as Nadeem Ahmed, who went on to pick four wickets, got on the wickets column. Shakib stitched another small partnership with the then skipper Mushfiqur Rahim, but that too lasted less than five overs and the moment it came to an end, all hell broke loose. Bangladesh went from 85/3 to 108 all out as Nadeem Ahmed triggered a massive collapse for the hosts.

Shakib, the highest run-scorer of the innings, also played his part with the ball, doing with all his might to help Bangladesh get those two points somehow but a couple of 30s from Irfan Ahmed and Munir Dar meant that Hong Kong chased the total down in the final over, despite being eight down.

It was one of the upsets of the tournament as Bangladesh managed to beat Afghanistan and Nepal in their group to advance to the second round, but ended up losing all four matches in Super 10.