Chittagong: Rangpur Riders jumped into the top slot from the 3rd position in point table of the 4th Bangladesh Premier League T20 with their 5th victory by 7 wickets against Khulna Titans at Zahur Ahmed Chowdhury Stadium on Tuesday.

Rangpur wrapped up the Chittagong phase of the seven-team tournament with three consecutive victories as they earlier defeated Barisal Bulls and defending champion Comilla Victorians by 12 runs and nine-wicket respectively at the same venue.

Rangpur ousted Khulna by virtue of more net run rate collecting 10 points from six games having five wins and one loss.

Khulna also collected 10 points, but from seven matches with five wins and two loses, followed by Dhaka Dynamites with eight points from seven games having four wins and three losses.

In the day's match, chasing a target of 126, Rangpur reached their destination scoring 129 for 3 in 19 overs riding on the 2nd pair contribution of 74 in 10 overs between Mohammad Mithun and opener Mohammad Shahzad.

Number-5 batsman Liam Dawson (unbeaten 5 off 4b) hit a boundary in the last ball off Mahmudullah Riyad in 19th over to draw the winning line.

Mithun and Shahzad started from 13/1 in 3.2 overs that ended at 87/2 in 13.2 overs as Shahzad was caught by Alok Kapali off Mahmudullah Riyad bowling. 

Mithun continued till the end to hammer unbeaten 49 off 41 balls, including one boundary and three over boundaries. 

Shahzad fired four boundaries and one over boundary off 38 balls to score out for 37 runs.

Shahid Afridi was adjudged man of the match for his all-round performance as he scored 26 runs with bat while captured two wickets with ball for Rangpur. 

Afridi was bowled out by Benny Howell at 122/3 in 17.5 overs, after facing 20 balls to fire two boundaries and one over boundary.

Mahmudullah, Junaid Khan and Howell took one wicket each for 14, 23 and 31 runs in 3, 4 and 4 overs respectively.

Batting first after winning the toss, Khulna scored 125 for 7 in 20 overs, riding on the 4th pair stand of 56 in 9.1 overs between Taibur Rahman and Riki Wessels.

Taibur and Wessels started from 38/3 in 7.1 and finished at 94/4 in 16.2 overs as Wessels was caught by skipper Naeem Islam off Rubel Hossain bowling. 

Taibur Rahman scored 32 off 37 balls, including three boundaries and one six. Wessels added 27 runs while Ariful Haque (22), skipper Mahmudullah Riyad (11) and opening batsman Abdul Mazid (10) were the other double figure scorer for the side.

Delivering four overs each, Arafat Sunny, Rubel Hossain and Shahid Afridi bagged two wickets apiece for 16, 19 and 30 runs respectively.

Rangpur started their tournament campaign with a nine-wicket victory against Chittagong Vikings and secured another nine-wicket victory over Khulna Titans chasing down this edition BPL lowest target of 45 runs, before conceding the only loss by 78 runs against Dhaka Dynamites in Mirpur.