Rangpur Riders clinch first ever BPL title

Rangpur Riders tasted their first ever BPL title while their skipper Mashrafe lifted his fourth BPL trophy as the Riders routed the defending champions Dhaka Dynamites by 57 runs in the final of AKS BPL 2017 on Tuesday at Sher-e-Bangla National Cricket Stadium.  
With the glittering trophy in hand, Mashrafe can be said as the most successful skipper for BPL as he won the title of the first two edition for Dhaka Gladiators and title of the third edition for Comilla Victorians.
Winning the toss, Dhaka Dynamites sent Rangpur Riders to bat first. Riding on the explosive ton by Chris Gayle and well supporting fifty from Brendon McCullum the Riders posted a massive total of 206 runs for only one wicket in 20 overs. In pursuit, Dhaka Dynamites were far way to run down the target of 207 runs as they scored 149 runs for nine wickets.
In the runs chase, Dhaka lost their first wicket in the third ball of the first over as Mashrafe made Mehedi Maruf a LBW victim for a duck. In the next over they lost Joe Denly with only one run on the board by within five overs they lost the wickets of Evin Lewis (15) and Kieron Pollard (4) with the team total of 29 runs.
Shakib and Jahurul Islam then tried to overcome the early collapse and added 32 runs for the fifth wicket pair. Nazmul broke the pair taking the wicket of Shakib. Shakib (26) tried to play a sweep shot but missed the line and saw the ball hit his leg stumps.
Dhaka then lost two more wickets of Mosaddek Hossain (1) and Shahid Afridi within a span 13 runs and their total turned to 87 runs for seven wickets. Jahurul Islam and Sunil Narine then scored 42 runs for the eight wicket stand that only minimised the margin.
Jahurul scored the highest 50 runs. For Rangpur, Nazmul, Sohag Gazi and Udana hauled two wickets each.  
Earlier, the starting of Rangpur was not good enough as they lost their first wicket for only five runs in the second over. Johnson Charles was caught and bowled by Dhaka skipper Shakib Al Hasan after scoring only three runs.
Though Rangpur lost first wicket early, Chris Gayle and Brendon McCullum recovered it soon. Gayle was aggressive while McCullum played the supporting role and was playing rotating the strike.
Gayle punished almost all the bowlers of Dhaka. He hit his fifty in 33 balls and converted it to a ton in 57 balls.  It was his fifth ton in BPL. The Caribbean giant was unbeaten with 146 runs off 69 balls. On the way to playing the magnificent innings he hit 18 sixes- the highest in any T20 cricket.
For the second wicket stand, Gayle assisted 201 runs with Brendon McCullum which was highest in any wicket stand in BPL. The previous highest was 197 made by Khulna Royals' batters Shahriar Nafees and Lou Vincent in 2013.
Brendon McCullum also hit a fifty and remained unbeaten with 51 runs off 43 balls with four fours and three sixes.
The duo scored 66 runs in last four overs. Among the Dhaka bowlers, Narine's economy was lowest as he conceded only 18 runs in four overs.