Binaya Raj Pandey, the president of Cricket Association of Nepal (CAN) and ACC vice-president, said a meeting of the ACC Executive Committee in Dhaka on December 12 endorsed the ranking. [break]
Hong Kong has been ranked second, Malaysia third, Afghanistan fourth and Singapore fifth in the ranking based on a two-year cycle for men´s cricket -- senior as well as age-group.
The newest ranking is determined by the teams´ placing in the ACC Trophies, ACC U-19 and U-16 Cups.
The list of top 10, also the qualifiers for the ACC Twenty20 Cup 2011, includes Oman (sixth), Saudi Arabia (seventh), Kuwait (eighth), UAE (ninth) and Bhutan (tenth).
The ranking will stay in place until December 2012 and it is the determining factor on the basis of which annual development budget of USD 1,400,000 will be distributed among 18 non-Test playing nations of Asia, according to ACC.
During the last two years, Nepal finished ACC Trophy Elite and ACC U-16 Elite as runners-up and ACC U-19 Elite as third-placed team.
Nepal was ranked second in 2007-09 ranking.
“Since we are top team in the ranking, ACC will provide us between USD 50,000 to 60,000 for infrastructure development,” Pandey added.
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