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MIRPUR: By his own admission Tamim Iqbal wasn't at his imperious best against India on Saturday. Even though he top-scored with 70 in Bangladesh's pursuit of a 371-run target, the hard-hitting left-hander was not in full flow.

"The ball was not coming on to the bat and I was not timing the ball well. I, therefore, decided to stay at the wicket instead of throwing it away," Tamim said after Monday's practice session.

Wasn't it unusual for him to graft for runs? "It is, but that's what Sachin had advised me once. He had said that on some days 'you will find everything in your zone and the ball hitting the middle of the bat, but on other days when all is not going your way, you have to graft'. I remembered his words when I was out there in the middle and carried on. I knew that I could always make up for all the dot balls at a later stage," Tamim recalled.

Sachin, in fact, lauded Tamim for showing lot of restraint while making 70 off 86 balls. "After the game, I had gone up to Sachin and he told me that, given the situation, my approach was correct," Tamim said.

Asked if he, like Virender Sehwag, had ever contemplated batting through all the 50 overs, Tamim said: "My teammates keep telling that to me. I am a team man and I follow instructions. It is my job to make most of the Powerplay overs and get as many as we can in the first 15 and then take it from there."

The flamboyant opener reckoned that Bangladesh had given away 50 to 60 runs too many to India.

"Had the target been around 310, we could have perhaps made it across the line. Also, I think, fielding first was justified as we have many spinners in the side who would have struggled to grip a dew-soaked ball, but all that is history. We still have everything to play for," Tamim said.