Nepal defeated Papua New Guinea by 3 wickets in the tri-nation series held in UAE under World Cup League-2 cricket on Friday.
Nepal achieved the target of 180 runs given by PNG by losing 7 wickets in 48 overs. Asif Shaikh and Sandeep Lamichhane, the opening batsmen for Nepal, performed brilliantly. Asif scored 86 and Sandeep scored 35 while remaining unbeaten.
Nepal’s victory became possible after they shared 77 runs for the eighth wicket. Nepal was in crisis after 6 batsmen got out without scoring runs in double figures. Asif took care of Nepal who lost 6 wickets for 74 runs. Sandeep came to the crease after Kushal Mall got out after scoring 105 runs.
Nepal had never shared so many runs for the eighth wicket in ODI cricket before. Dipendrasinh Airi and Sompal Kami recently created a new national record with a partnership of 55 runs against Scotland. Before that, Nepal’s opening batsman Kushal Bhurtel could not open his account.
Gyanendra Malla scored 6 runs and Bhim Sarki scored 8 runs while Arif Sheikh and Rohit Poudel were dismissed for one run each. Dipendra Singh Airi could not add 8 runs. Kushal Malla scored 23 runs. For Nepal, who lost Kushal Bhurtel in the first ball, Asif shared 32 runs with Bhim Sarki for the third wicket, 21 runs with Dipendra for the sixth wicket and 31 runs with Kushal Malla for the seventh wicket.
After winning the toss, PNG batted first and scored 179 runs losing all wickets with 4 balls remaining. Sompal and Dipendra took two wickets each while Sandeep, Karan KC and Kushal Malla took one wicket each.
With 30 points from 31 games in the World Cup League 2, Nepal is in the sixth place in the table. Nepal, who defeated PNG in the first match of the ongoing series, lost by 68 runs to the home team UAE on Thursday. In the last match of this series, Nepal will now play against UAE.
