KATHMANDU, Dec 29: Departmental teams Armed Police Force (APF) and Tribhuvan Army Club will vie in the final of men's T20 cricket tournament under the Seventh National Games after they won their respective semifinal clashes played on Friday at Baijnathpur in Biratnagar.
Both APF and Army registered identical eight-wicket wins over Central Region and Nepal Police Club respectively.
In the first semifinal, APF bowled out Central Region for a meager total of 61 runs in 17.5 overs after the latter elected to bat. In the run chase, APF surpassed the target in 9.3 overs losing two wickets.
Pradeep Airee contributed unbeaten 33 runs for APF while Prithu Baskota was not out on nine runs.
Earlier, none of the Central Region batsmen besides opener Hari Shankar Shah (21 runs off 28 runs) scored in double digits. Karan KC and Basanta Regmi of APF pocketed two wickets each.
In another match, openers Sagar Pun and Anil Mandal starred with the bat for Army as it achieved a mammoth target of 145 runs set by Police in 18.3 overs for the loss of two wickets. Sagar (59 runs off 48 balls) and Anil (not out 62 runs off 54 balls) played 114-run stand for the first wicket before the former was bowled by Manjeet Shrestha. Naresh Budhayer contributed five runs and Raju Rijal remained unbeaten for six runs.
Earlier, opener Dilip Nath (35 runs), Sunil Dhamala (15 runs), Arif Seikh (35 runs), Dipendra Airee (10 runs) and Ram Naresh Giri (15 runs) contributed for Police as it made 144/10 at close.
Sompal Kami of Army was the pick of bowling claiming three wickets. Bikram Sob and Chandra Saud shared two wickets each for Army.
The final match will be played on Friday.
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