KATHMANDU: Tribhuvan Army Club has emerged victorious in the Prime Minister’s Cup Men’s National Cricket Tournament with a 33-run victory over APF.
While chasing the victory target of 212 runs set by the Army at the Tribhuvan University ground in Kirtipur, the APF lost all its wickets in 41.3 overs and managed to score 178 runs only.
The Army managed to lift the winning trophy in the fourth attempt. Out of the three previous editions, Army was the joint winner for the first edition and runner-up in the the subsequent editions.
The victorious Army Club received Rs 1 million in cash along with the trophy. Similarly, APF, which was limited to runners-up, received Rs 500,000 in cash.
The three bowlers of Army today played an excellent spell. Bikram Sob, Jitendra Mukhiya and Sahab Alam took three wickets apiece.
APF captain Sharad Bheswakar out on zero. He had come into bat after losing opener Subash Khakurel for 21 runs. Ashif Sheikh played a half-century innings of 61 runs but could not stop the team’s defeat.
Returning to the pavilion after being caught by Rohit Poudel off Jitendra Mukhiya, Ashif hit eight fours and one six off 71 balls. Sumit Maharjan contributed 19 runs while Sundip Jora returned with 29 runs. Three APF players were able to play openly against the fast bowlers while the other three batsmen were reduced to 10 runs.
Earlier, after losing the toss, Army was invited to bat first and added 211 runs for the loss of 9 wickets in 50 overs.
Hari Bahadur Chauhan alone added 58 runs for the Army. Rajesh Pulami added 28 runs while Shaham Alam added 25 runs off 14 balls. Lokesh Bam, Rohit Poudel, Vikram Sob and Anil Mandal scored 15, 13 and 11 runs respectively. Captain Binod Bhandari and Bhim Sharki added 7 runs each.
