Young Tigers battle for a spot in the final

The ICC U-19 World Cup tournament started off with a big nine-wicket win. And from then on, the Bangladesh U-19 team has been on a winning streak.

Out of the four games they have played so far, Akbar Ali, Towhid Hridoy and co have won three with one game washed out.

To reach the final though, the team will have to face the New Zealand U-19 team and beat them at Potchefstroom.

The match that starts at 2 pm (Bangladesh Standard Time) has Bangladesh in as slight favourites.

Although the U-19 World Cup has seen the Kiwis have a good record overall, in the past few years, Bangladesh have improved leaps and bounds.

In the last series where the Bangladesh U-19 team faced the New Zealand U-19 team in New Zealand, they won it 1-4.

The performances from the Young Tigers have also been brighter in the current World Cup where in Group C, they won by nine wickets against Zimbabwe.

Then they won big against Scotland and then the third match against Pakistan was a hiccup in the batting order, but the match eventually got washed out by rain.

In the quarter-final against the hosts South Africa, it was once again a dominant performance as Bangladesh waltzed home to a 104-run victory.

Ahead of the final, Captain Akbar Ali has been brimming with confidence: "Mentally and physically, we have prepared ourselves very well. Now it's up to us to deliver those skills in the field and hopefully the results will come our way. New Zealand have come all this way by playing good, solid cricket and our aim is to keep them down to as low a total as possible. They have good batsmen in their lower order, so we have to be weary of that too."

But to put Bangladesh's performances so far and compare them with how New Zealand have performed in the World Cup, also paints a clear picture of how much more dominant Bangladesh have been so far.

While Bangladesh won all their matches by big margins, the Kiwis have had to work harder for their wins.

New Zealand have also been defeated in one game, against India, who are already in the final.

Their tournament started off with their Group A match against Japan being washed out, while in the second game against Sri Lanka, they won with just one delivery and three wickets in hand.

In the quarter-final, it was once again a hard-fought victory as New Zealand won with just two deliveries and two wickets left.

Left-arm off-spinner Rakibul Hasan could become a big weapon for Bangladesh and a big worry for New Zealand in the semi-final.

Spin isn't an area of strength traditionally for the Kiwis and Rakibul was devastating against the Proteas – another team that is equally weak against spin – where he took five wickets for just 19 runs.

On the other hand, batsman Tanzim Hasan Sakib, Tanzid Hasan and Parvez Hasan have all been in fluent form with the bat and will bode well for Bangladesh.

A victory against New Zealand will be history-making for Bangladesh as they would be reaching the final of the U-19 World Cup for the first time in history.

Their best result in the 11 previous occasions have been a place in the semis and a third place finish in the 2016 edition.