However, contrary to the assurance of the coach and the captain, Nepal not only failed to make into the top six of the tournament but finished at the bottom of the table in Group A, which comprised of seven teams.
Only top six among 14 contenders qualify for next year' World Cup slated to be held in India. The teams finishing on top four positions during the group stage matches will be eligible to vie for six spots available for the World Cup.
Nevertheless, Nepal which started its campaign on a winning note with six-wicket victory over the USA, lost last four group matches in a row after sharing a point with Namibia after the second match that was washed out. Nepal never put commanding total during the matches it batted first. "The team lacked fighting spirit in tough and changing conditions," commented Nepal's coach Dassanayake.
Cricket analyst Binay Kumar Jha who is also an international cricket umpire pointed out Nepal's failure in batting and experiment during the tournament as the reason for under par performance.
Coach Pubudu Dassanayake experimented with openers in almost every match Nepal played. However, none of them fetched sound partnership. He also experimented in batting orders. Nepal started with opening pair of Sagar Pun and Anil Mandal against USA and Ireland, while Sagar and Subash Khakurel opened against Hong Kong. Likewise, the pair of Sagar and Pradeep Airee started Nepal's batting against PNG, while Pradeep and Binod Bhandari came to open with bat against Jersey.
"The Qualifiers is not a stage for experiment all the time and Nepali team spent the entire tournament in experiment. It seemed like Nepal was not playing in the Qualifiers rather than a practice matches," said Jha, who believes Nepal performed only 25 percent of its potential in batting.
Before that tournament, Nepal had a hectic training scheduled. It travelled to India for closed camp training, spent two weeks there and also played four 20-over matches. Without spending a single week at home after returning from India, Nepal moved to Europe where it played four 20-over matches in England and four-match T20I series against the Netherlands before the qualifiers.
Nepal even played two 20-over matches in a single day in England and played first T20I against the Netherlands the very next day.
However, before leaving for Europe coach Dassanayake had told that the schedule will not affect Nepal's ambition of finishing on top. According to Dassanayake, Nepali team members also struggled to adjust in European condition.
But Nepal's skipper Paras time and again said that European conditions had nothing to do with Nepal's performances. He had also added that Nepal failed to put up good show in most of the matches.
Nepal defeated by Jersey
KATHMANDU (REPUBLICA): Nepal faced fourth straight defeat in the ICC World Twenty20 Qualifiers on Saturday after going down by seven wickets against Jersey in its last Group A match being held in Ireland and Scotland.
Losing the toss, Nepal started batting first and put 105/8 in allotted 20 overs. Siddhant Lohani scored 27 runs off 16 balls hitting two sixes and two fours for Nepal. Gyanendra Malla added 26 runs off 33 balls that included a boundary. Sharad Vesawkar (16) and Paras Khadka (11) were other batsmen to reach double figures.
Player-of-the-match Nat Watkins bagged three wickets for Jersey, which chased the target in 16.1 overs losing three wickets.
Jonty Jenner (30), Peter Gough (27) and Cornelis Bodenstein (27) ensured Jersey's win.
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