Sport Desk:

Bangladesh High Performance (HP) team’s last phase of the ongoing Australia tour began with the nine-team Top End T20 series 2024 on Friday while the Bangladeshi side will play their first match against Melbourne Renegades Academy on Sunday.

The series, involved with HP team, Pakistan Shaheens, two local Australian teams — Australian Capital Territory, Northern Territory Strike and five Big Bash franchises – Adelaide Strikers Academy, Renegades Academy, Melbourne Stars Academy, Perth Scorchers Academy and Tasmanian Tigers, began with the first match Northern Territory and Scorchers on Friday.

Northern Territory beat Scorchers by seven wickets in the series opener held in Darwin.

However, each team will play six matches in the round-robin group phase.

Akbar Ali-led Bangladeshi side will play their rest of the five matches against, Adelaide Strikers, Tasmanian, Capital Territory, Shaheens and Scorchers respectively on 12, 14,15,16 and 17 August.

Earlier, HP played two four-day matches against Shaheens and a 50-over tri-team series, named ‘Bi-literal 50-over Series’ involving Shaheens and Northern Territory.

HP beat Shaheens in the first four-day match by five runs but lost the second match by 148 runs.

In the tri-team 50-over series, HP beat Northern Territory by 112 runs but lost to Shaheens eight-wicket.