GREATER NOIDA, July 13: Dipendra Singh Airee notched up a well-timed fifty but in a losing cause as Noida XI registered their first win against a Nepal-U19 team at Shaheed Vijay Pathik Sports Complex, Greater Noida, Uttar Pradesh.
An all-round effort from Noida bowlers saw them share 10 wickets on route to bundling out Nepal for 166 runs in 42 overs. Nepal U-19 lost the match by 68 runs as they couldn’t get close to the target of 234 posted by Noida XI. Former India U-19 batsman Tanmay Srivastava carried his bat contributing 120 runs in 149 deliveries smashing seven fours and three sixes.
Middle-order batsman Airee smashed two fours and two sixes in his innings of 55 runs accumulating 68 deliveries. He added 63 runs in partnership with Sandeep Sunar who contributed 36 runs in Nepal’s total which included four fours and one six. IPL bowler Anureet Singh, Nimit Saini and Harshit Sethi picked up two wickets each supported by Ravi Singh, Gaurav Singh and Depanshu Yadav’s one wicket each. Former India T20 International bowler Parwinder Awana castled Airee’s stumps which was his solitary wicket of the match.
Earlier, a rearguard action from Tanmay ensured Noida get 234 runs on the board losing eight wickets. He was supported by Rahul Yadav’s 33 runs and Kings XI Punjab all-rounder Anureet Singh’s 28 runs. Nepal continued to rest their regular skipper Sandeep Lamichhane. Rijan Dhakal and Pawan Sarraf picked up two wickets each. Rohit Poudel, Lalit Rajbanshi and Shahab Alam picket up one wicket each.
Nepal is in Greater Noida and has completed their set of practice matches with three wins, one loss and one no-result preparing for Asia Qualifiers scheduled to start on July 17.
Nepal U19 team will travel to Singapore on July 14, 2017, to participate in the ICC U19 Asia Qualifiers to be held in Singapore. Malaysia, Singapore, and Afghanistan are the other three nations who will compete along with Nepal for a place in the U19 World Cup to be held in New Zealand in 2018. Nepal will face hosts Singapore on July 17 in their first match of the qualifiers.