Warner leads Australia to top of Cricket World Cup standings

8:44 am on 21 June 2019

Australia continued their march towards the Cricket World Cup semi-finals helped by a tournament-high 166 for opener David Warner as they beat Bangladesh by 48 runs.

Australia scored 381-5 before restricting Bangladesh to 333-8 in Nottingham.

It's Australia's fifth victory in six games and puts them at the top of the standings on 10 points and looking assured of a top-four finish, probably alongside England, India and New Zealand.

Australia's fifth victory in six games put them top of the standings on 10 points and looking assured of a top-four finish, probably alongside England, India and New Zealand.

It was a third defeat in six for Bangladesh and though they are still fifth on five points, they will need a run of wins and other results to go their way to make the knockout phase.

Warner, with his second century of the tournament, and captain Aaron Finch (53) again laid the platform with a carefully-constructed opening stand of 121, while Usman Khawaja (89) and Glenn Maxwell, who smashed 32 from 10 balls, helped the five-times champions to their mammoth total.

Having chased down 322 with eight overs to spare against West Indies on Monday, Bangladesh set about their task with confidence despite facing what would have been the second-highest run chase in one-day cricket.

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Roared on by a mass of supporters, Tamim Iqbal and Shakib Al Hasan were going along nicely but when Shakib was out for 41 with the score at 102 their hopes effectively ended and an entertaining partnership between Mushfiqur Rahim (102 not out) and Mahmudullah (69) was never going to be enough.

A frank Warner than admitted in an on-field interview he was "trying to make up for that year" following the ball-tampering scandal.

"It's just more runs that you can miss out on," Warner explained later.

"For me it's about going out there and putting my best foot forward for the team and trying to score as many runs as I can.

"To make up for all the runs that I've missed out on and for the team."

"I don't mean to go out there and bat slow," Warner said.

"I've tried to get a calculation how many fielders I've hit in the first 10 (overs).

"I got frustrated against India. I got frustrated against Afghanistan. And then today, Finchy kept telling me to hang in there and bat deep and bat time.

"And that was in like the eighth or ninth over. Because it's generally not my game to stick there - and I usually try and go after it a little bit.

"Must be a bit more maturity, I think."

Australia's World Cup kicks into gear next week, with games against England and New Zealand at Lord's.

The win means Australia are now first on 10 points and could only miss the finals if they lose their last three games and a number of other results go against them.

RNZ Cricket World Cup schedule.

Photo: RNZ / Suneil Narsai

-Reuters