KATHMANDU, Sept 8: Nepal has announced a 15-member squad to play in the Under-19 (U-19) One Day Cricket Championship being held in India.

The One-Day Cricket Championship is being organized by Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) from September 12 to 18.

Ashif Shekh will lead the Nepali U-19 team as skipper. The other players include Triraj Das, Rabi Shah, Bipin Rawal, Lokesh Bom, Rit Gautam, Pwan Sarraf, Kishor Mahato, Rashid Khan, Bhim Sarki, Kamal Singh Airi, Sundip Jora, Sagar Dhakal, Arun Airi and Mohammad Samsad Alam.

No player of the national cricket team figures in the U-19 championship.
U-19 players of championship hosts India, the Indian National Cricket Academy and Afghanistan are competing in the tournament. The Nepali squad will leave on Monday for India to participate in the championship.

KATHMANDU, Sept 1: A match between Nepal and Malaysia under Asia Cup Qualifier has begun a while ago at Oval Cricket Ground at Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Nepal has started batting first after losing the toss.

The match has begun a while ago following the rainfall in the morning, said Team Manager of Nepali Cricket Team, Raman Shiwakoti.

The 50-over match has now been limited to 30 overs. Nepal has to win today’s match to reach to top 2 of the Asia Cup Qualifier at any cost. Nepal’s dream of Asia Cup Qualifier would be shattered if it loses today’s match.

Nepal will play against Singapore and Hong Kong on September 2 and September 4 respectively. Nepal has won latest five one-day matches against Malaysia. RSS

KATHMANDU, Aug 30: United Arab Emirates (UAE) has posted a target of 255 runs against Nepal in the second match of the Asia Cup Qualifiers 2018 underway in the Bayuemas Oval in Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia.

Invited to bat first after losing the toss, UAE made 254 runs in the stipulated 50 overs at the loss of nine wickets. Opener Chirag Suri hit 65 runs with one six and seven fours. Likewise, another opener Ashfaq Ahmed made 45 runs, while Rameez Shahzad 35 and Adnan Mufti 41.

For Nepal, Sandip Lamichhane took highest four wickets conceding 24 runs in 10 overs. He bowled two maiden overs. Likewise, Basanta Regmi and Sompal Kami claimed two wickets each. Nepal is batting later today. RSS

Khawaja, the first Muslim to wear the baggy green, told The Sydney Morning Herald he had considered whether it was possible to wear a uniform which did not have the logo of Cricket Australia’s key sponsor the VB brewery.

“I understand what Fawad is doing, and I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought about it,” Khawaja told the newspaper.

“I thought about it for this Ashes campaign. But I probably haven’t been in the Australian team for long enough to worry about it too much.”

Khawaja, 26, struggled in the Ashes series in England earlier this year and remains on the fringes of the Test team.

Leg spinner Ahmed was exempted from wearing the VB logo in England after he explained that it clashed with his Islamic faith — a move which sparked a row and criticism that he should not accept sponsorship money from companies promoting alcohol.

Khawaja said he had discussed the matter with South African batsman Hashim Amla, who has been exempted from wearing a brewery’s logo, about how he could reconcile with his strongly-held Muslim beliefs.

“He just said to me he doesn’t accept prize money from whoever their alcoholic sponsor is,” Khawaja said.

“I assume if I ever did do it, that’s the path I’d lead. But at the moment it’s all about the cricket for me.”

Pakistan-born Khawaja said Carlton and United Breweries, makers of VB beer, were a “massive sponsor for Cricket Australia so obviously there needs to be some give and take there” and he was willing to forgo some money if need be.

The left-hander signed Tuesday with Sydney Thunder for the next two seasons of the domestic Twenty20 competition, a move which will see him join Test captain Michael Clarke, David Warner and veteran Mike Hussey.

In the match held today, India posted a total of 269 runs in the stipulated 50 overs after being put into bat.

In reply, Nepal could muster only 184 runs in their full quota of overs at the loss of eight wickets.

This is the second loss for Nepal after going down by three runs in the first match against Afghanistan.

Nepal will now face Pakistan in its third match to be held on Wednesday.

NEW DELHI: Some former cricketers may have selected their best-ever Indian team recently, but captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni does not favour such a practice, saying “one should respect every individual who has played for the country”.

“It’s very difficult to compare and compile all the players and teams of all era. Personally, I won’t select my best team ever because I feel we should respect everyone who has played for India,” Dhoni said at a promotional event on Monday.

Two stalwarts of Indian cricket — Kapil Dev andSourav Ganguly — recently picked their best-ever Indian ODI squads which had a few surprises. Surprisingly, while Kapil’s all-time best ODI squad did not have a single player from India’s 1983 World Cup-winning side, Ganguly’s dream ODI and Test teams reflected a post-Eighties selection.

Ganguly ignored the spin troika of Bishan Singh Bedi, Erapalli Prasanna and B S Chandrasekhar in any squad. He named VVS Laxman as 12th man in Test squad while totally ignoring Mohammed Azharuddin.

Unlike the 1983 World Cup-winning captain Kapil who did not include himself in his dream ODI team, Ganguly didn’t hesitate to name himself in both the ODI and Test teams he selected.

In what can be seen as a ray of hope for out-of-favour seniors like Gautam Gambhir, Virender Sehwag, Yuvraj Singh and others, Dhoni said that not age but form and fitness was crucial for the success of any cricketer.

“I don’t think age is a factor. What matters is form and fitness and not age,” he said.

He was also of the view that all forms of the game are important.

“They are all inter-related. Performance in one will have an impact on the other form,” Dhoni said.

Dhoni, undoubtedly the most successful Indian captain of all-time, lauded his deputy Virat Kohlifor his leadership qualities.

“Kohli is a fantastic cricketer. He has great knowledge about the game and has done well as a captain. He has all the right recipes. He is very expressive on the field,” said the wicket-keeper batsman under whose leadership India had won both the ICC Twenty20 World Cup and the ICC 50-over World Cup apart from this year’s Champions Trophy.

The 29 March final follows semi-finals at the Sydney Cricket Ground and Auckland’s Eden Park, organisers said on Tuesday.

Christchurch, which has scrambled to rebuild facilities in the wake of a ruinous earthquake in 2011, has provisionally been awarded three pool matches in the tournament hosted by Australia and New Zealand from 14 February to 29 March.

Local cricket authorities have submitted plans for a redevelopment of Hagley Park in New Zealand’s second largest city, and are awaiting the outcome of an Environment Court hearing as to whether they can proceed.

If approved, the city would host the opening match of the tournament between 1996 World Cup champions Sri Lanka and New Zealand on 14 February.

“We haven’t had international cricket, Test matches for five years and one dayers for three years so we just have to get the environment court to okay it to get cricket back to Christchurch,” the former New Zealand bowler Richard Hadlee told local television at the New Zealand launch of the event.

“It’s important for the city, for the people and for youngsters too who idolise the players. It gives them the chance to see them and those three games will be hugely critical.”

Organisers said the pool matches would be split evenly between both countries with seven cities hosting three pool matches each.

“The last World Cup was the most successful ever … We decided that every team should play in both countries and that’s what we’ve gone and done,” the world cup chief executive John Harnden said.

Australia’s Sydney Cricket Ground, Adelaide Oval and the MCG would host three of the quarter-finals, while Wellington would host the fourth quarter-final.

The 2015 World Cup will feature the 10 full member nations of the International Cricket Council plus Ireland, who have won qualification, and three other nations.

Two of the teams will be determined via a qualifying tournament in New Zealand in January 2014.

Each of the 14 teams had been divided into two pools where they play each other in a round-robin format before the top four from each pool qualify for the quarter-finals.

England took three late Australia wickets to assume a commanding position going into the final day of an enthralling opening Ashes Test.

Chasing a target of 311, a record score to win a Trent Bridge Test, Australia were going well on 161-3.

But in a potentially decisive twist in the final hour, England removed captain Michael Clarke, Steven Smith and Phil Hughes in the space of 18 balls to reduce the tourists to 174-6 at the close, still 137 runs adrift of the finish line.

England had earlier added 49 runs to their overnight total to post 375 all out, with Ian Bell completing his 18th Test century and Stuart Broad scoring 65.

Broad, the subject of a major controversy over his decision not to walk on Friday,followed up with an impressive display with the ball, breaking Australia’s 84-run opening partnership and removing Clarke for 23 in the closing stages of a sweltering day in which England had toiled for long stretches without reward.

Pitching the ball up to Clarke, Broad drew a faint edge from the Australia captain and wheeled away in celebration as Matt Prior took the catch.

The festivities were put on hold as the umpires verified that the ball had carried into Prior’s gloves and were delayed still further when Clarke called for a review. But when Hot Spot showed the smallest of marks on his bat, the skipper had to go.

The dismissal of Australia’s leading batsman marked a total shift in the momentum of the match as Smith was trapped right in front of his stumps by Graeme Swann, who had previously bowled 22 wicketless overs.

Two overs later, Australia were six wickets down as Hughes – who scored an unbeaten 81 in the first innings – was struck on the back pad after missing a spinning delivery from Swann and given out on review.

Birmingham, June 16 (ANI): Indian cricket fans were jubilant as India defeated a disappointed Pakistan by the Duckworth-Lewis method in front of a sell-out crowd at Edgbaston in Birmingham after a series of rain interruptions resulted in three revised victory targets.
On the day, it was the Indian supporters who were celebrating after Mahendra Singh Dhoni had won the toss and elected to field.
The Indians reached their final target of 102 from 22 overs with 17 balls to spare in bright evening sunshine after dismissing Pakistan for 165 from 39.4 of their allotted 40 overs.
Opening batsman Shikar Dhawan, who scored 114 and 102 not out in the first two group matches, again top-scored for the winners with 48 from 41 deliveries.
In Birmingham, Indians celebrated with great fervour the win over Pakistan.
Raghu, a fan of the Indian cricket team, said that he had come all the way from London to watch the match and he was not at all disappointed with the outcome.
“My first reaction obviously, one of the biggest game in the tournament India-Pakistan with a houseful of 40,000 crowd on it, and India won the game today (Saturday), and that’s amazing,” said Raghu.
Several fans said irrespective of the outcome of the other matches, this win was equivalent to winning the World Cup again for the Indians.
India enjoyed early success after their captain Dhoni had won the toss when Nasir Jamshed (2) was caught at second slip by Suresh Raina pushing forward to a full delivery from Bhuvneshwar Kumar.
Wicket-keeper Kamran Akmal, promoted to open in an attempt to bolster the fragile Pakistan top order, and Mohammad Hafeez took the total to 50 from 12 overs before the players went off for a brief rain break.
In New Delhi, fans gathered together in large numbers to watch this momentous cricket match and celebrated India’s victory over Pakistan.
“Before today, India had never won a match against Pakistan in the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) Champion’s Trophy, but today, they won the match in a convincing manner.This team is actually clicking like a unit whether they are the bowlers under Mahendra Singh Dhoni or the batsman, all of them are coming together as a cohesive unit, and of course, there is a word called pride. It means when a lot of lions hunt together and that is what we are seeing in the Indian team right now,” said Mohit, a fan.
The final match in Group B had no bearing on next week’s semi-finals as India has already qualified while Pakistan was eliminated after losing their first two matches.
There was still plenty of pride at stake, though, in what was only the third competitive match in England between the two sub-continent rivals. All 24,000 tickets were sold within three hours of going on sale in November last year. By Praful Kumar Singh (ANI)