Nepal surpassed UAE by 5 wickets in their first warm-up match of the very crucial tourney, ICC World Cup Qualifier 2018. Winning the toss, UAE opted to have batted first on rain-affected match. Earlier, match was delayed for almost 3 hours due to wet outfield. Delayed resulted deduction of 21 overs per innings. The match was shortened to 29 overs.
UAE posted the respectable total of 171 runs on board with blistering 66 runs partnership between Ashfaq Ahmed (42) and Ghulam Sabber (32). UAE lost their skipper, Rohan Mustafa (04) in the second over itself with app-laudable out swinger from left-handed medium pacer Lalit Bhandari (4-40). Muhammad Usman (26) and Adnan Mufti (37) were other notable contributors for UAE’s first inning. Karan KC’s (38-3) three wickets in the penultimate over of the innings didn’t let UAE’s lower order to caused favorable damage. Sompal Kami and Basant Regmi didn’t roll an arm for Nepal.
In reply, Nepal once again showed glimpse of their batting failure with loss of 3 wickets inside first power-play. Nepal lost Gyanendra Malla (12), Dilip Nath (04) and Anil Sah (11) cheaply and was reduced to 39-3 in 7.5 over. 30 runs stand between Paras Khadka (28) and Sharad Vesawkar (41)* built the platform for Dipendra Airee (41) and Aarif Sheikh (23)* to seal a victory for Nepal.
Aarif Sheikh’s unbeaten quick fire of 23 runs from 15 balls with two fours and a six ensured Nepal’s victory with four balls to spare. For UAE, Amir Hayat picked up maximum two wickets. He sent back both Nepal’s opener Gyanendra Malla and Dilip Nath. Both the team still have a match under their belt before the commencement of the main draw. Nepal will face Hong Kong where UAE get fortune to play alongside West Indies.
