Kathmandu, Oct 19: Nepal smashed Saudi Arabia by a whopping margin of 348 runs in a match under the ACC Men’s U19 Premier Cup, 2023 underway in Malaysia.
The match was played at the YSD-UKM Cricket Oval. With this win, Nepal reached the semifinals by becoming the champion of Group ‘A’ in which it is placed. In chasing the 348 runs target, Saudi Arabia was restricted to meagre 46 runs in 19.1 overs losing all wickets.
For Saudi Arabia, Varun Saravanan Mudaliar hit highest 11 runs and Abdullah Shiraz nine. Muhammad Ghayour Ahmad Raza remained unbeaten on nine. For Nepal, Dipesh Kandel took six wickets singlehandedly, Aakash Chand two and Subash Bhandari one.
Losing the toss and batting first, Nepal scored 347 runs in the allotted 50 overs at the loss of eight wickets. For the winning country, Arjun Kumal scored a century. He hit 142, Aakash Tripathi 89 and Dipak Bohara 29. Likewise, Dipak Prakash Dumre 14, Milan Bohara nine and Dipesh Kandel 14. Bishal Bikram KC remained unbeaten on 24.
For Saudi Arabia, Muhammad Ahmad Raza and Muhammad Ghayour Ahmad bagged two wickets each. Zuhair Muhammad, Shiraz and Shazeeb Mujeebur Rahman claimed one each.
In the semifinals, Nepal will take on the winner of Group ‘D’. Earlier, in its first and second matches, Nepal thrashed Iran by 274 runs and Bahrain by seven wickets respectively.
Point Table
Group A
Nepal – 3 matches — 6 points
Saudi Arabia — 4 points
Bahrain — 2 points
Iran — 0 points
