There was no fairytale ending for Ireland after their superb comeback on day three in Dhaka as Bangladesh completed a seven wickets win 45 minutes after lunch.

The tourists could add only six runs, in nine overs, to their overnight total, leaving their hosts with 138 to win and despite Andy McBrine bowling unchanged from one end, he could not repeat his heroics from Wednesday evening.

He did have Najmul Shanto caught low down at slip and would have had Mominul Haque stumped, with just five to his name, only for a fumble by Lorcan Tucker but, in truth, it was a comfortable chase for Bangladesh who recorded their 17th Test win their 137th match.

For Ireland to take the game into the second session of day four in only their fourth Test, in totally alien conditions and without any red-ball action for the majority of the team in two years, it must be considered a tremendous effort.

At least Ireland will be acclimatised when they move on to Sri Lanka for two more Test matches - the first starting on Sunday week – although that promises to be even tougher against a much stronger bowling attack.

Ireland knew if they were going to cause a flutter in the Bangladesh camp they would probably have to bat for at least an hour this morning. But as it was, they lasted only 36 minutes with only five scoring strokes.

The big blow was losing McBrine in the fifth over, bowled by a beauty from the day’s second ball of pace, Ebadot Hossain moving one late to take out the off stump.

After that, Graham Hume seemed intent on protecting last man Ben White (who faced 10 balls), rather than scoring runs and paid the price when he  chased the last ball of Ebadot’s over, trying to keep the strike, and only steered it into the wicket-keeeper’s gloves.

With only 137 to defend, early wickets were essential but it was Bangladesh who went on the charge from the off and Ireland had no answer.

Litton Das, promoted to open, hit his first ball, from McBrine, for six and his second to the cover boundary and although Mark Adair dismissed him in his third over – he actually pulled a ball via his helmet onto the stumps – Bangladesh had already 32 runs on the board.

There was no sighting of the lesser spotted Graham Hume during the 27 overs as Ben White replaced Adair but he had to wait until after lunch for his wicket, skipper Tamim Iqbal also mistiming a pulled shot and only finding Murray Commins at mid-wicket.

But Mushfiqur, the leading run scorer in the match, announced his arrival after his first innings century by driving McBrine to the extra cover boundary and in what proved to be the penultimate over he reached another 50 from just 47 balls before hitting the winning run in the next over.