West Indies bowlers dished out hostile bowling reminiscent of their glorious predecessors to hammer Nepal by seven wickets in the Plate Championship final of the ICC U-19 Cricket World Cup at the Bayuemas Oval on Saturday.
The pace attack led by man-of-the-match Jason Dawes, who took four wickets, utilized the early freshness of the pitch to bowl Nepal out for mere 74 runs in 25.3 overs in the rain shortened 27-overs match. The Caribbean batsmen then reached the modest target in just 14.2 overs losing three wickets to take the Plate title away from defending champion.
Nepal’s decision to go with its usual formula of putting up a score and defending it by suffocating the opposition batsmen misfired as the pitch covered for the best part of three days due to persistent rain had life on it and the West Indies bowlers utilized it to the hilt.
“It’s only a 54-over game and the wicket doesn’t change that much in the second innings,” Nepali coach Roy Dias defended the decision. But his West Indies counterpart begged to differ.
“I was a bit surprised by their decision to bat first,” former West Indies Test player Larry Gomes exclaimed. “There was plenty of life in the wicket and the bowlers exploited it.”
Captain Paras Khadka too believed it was a right decision. “We had to go with our strength. We wanted to put around 120 on the board batting first,” skipper Paras Khadka said indicating to Nepal’s dismal performance while chasing.
The team gambled by sending Gyanendra Malla in to open with wicket keeper Mahesh Chhetri in place of Anil Mandal but Mahesh got out in the third ball of the first over.
Anil Mandal then edged down the leg side to keeper Devon Thomas in the last ball of the second over to make it 4/2.
Gyanendra, who had failed in the tournament coming, looked to be in good touch middling a few balls and even hit an exquisite flick to the square leg boundary but got a peach of a ball from Dawes that moved out to square him up for an edge to first slip.
Rom Shrestha then got a rough decision to be adjudged caught down the leg side reducing Nepal to 17/4. “We lost four wickets early as the boys were facing this pace for the first time,” Dias said.
Paras tried to counterattack hitting a couple of fours but once he fell to a diving catch in slips for 12, Nepal looked down and out. Sagar Khadka played valiantly taking up a nasty blow on his chest and made unbeaten 17 off 55 balls to topscore as none of the other batsmen could reach double figures.
Raj Shrestha also apparently got a rough decision but it was a disappointing batting performance. The total was largely contributed by 18 extras.
West Indies looked to be in a hurry while chasing the lowly target and both their openers were lucky to survive confident caught behind appeals of left-arm pacer Amrit Bhattarai. Kieron Powell made a quick-fire 24 off 16 balls including a towering sixer off Paras before edging Amrit at first slip while the other opener Adrien Barath got 15 before falling to Rahul BK.
Paras also had a confident caught behind appeal turned down against Barath. Amrit got another wicket as Darren Bravo finished Nepal off with a typically aggressive innings of 24 from 15 deliveries laced with three fours and a straight six.
“May be things could have been different. But to be frank 75 was simply not enough,” Paras reflected on the rough umpiring decisions.
“We wanted to win this title as we came from a tough group that included India and South Africa who have both reached final,” the victorious captain Shamarh Brooks said praising Amrit for his bowling. “He is one for the future.” The Nepali team will reach Kathmandu on Sunday.