The ESPN CricInfo, cricket most prestigious website, named Nepal’s captain Paras Khadka and Shakti Gauchan amongst the Best XI of the World T20 Cup Qualifiers.
In the list curated by Peter Della Penna, Paras and Shakti ‘caught the eyes in the list dominated by champion Ireland’s players’.
Four Irish players – Paul Stirling, Gary Wilson, Kevin O’Brien and Boyd Rankin, and a couple of Afhani players – Mohd Shahzad and Dawlat Zardan are included based on their performances in the Qualifiers.
Other players in the list are Raymond van Schoor of Namibia, Jamie Atkinson of Hong Kong, and Majid Haq of Scotland.
Cricinfo said Paras is Mr Everything for Nepal:
Paras Khadka (Nepal)
254 runs at 50.80, 7 wickets at 23.14Nepal’s Mr. Everything, Khadka is always under immense pressure to perform with the bat. On the first day he came through with 68 in an impressive 28-run win over Hong Kong to nab the first of three Man of the Match awards during the qualifiers. He rounded off the tournament in similar fashion, with 62 not out against Papua New Guinea to win the seventh-place game. That was just a day after he scored 26 not out and struck the winning boundary in a five-wicket victory over ODI-nation Kenya. The key to Nepal climbing up the Associates ladder is developing a few more batsmen to complement Khadka.
On Shakti, the website wrote:
Shakti Gauchan (Nepal)
16 wickets at 11.18Suffocating spin bowling is Nepal’s foundation for success and Gauchan was their chief exponent of that at the qualifiers, with a superb economy rate of 4.97. He bowled five maidens in the tournament, which was the most for any player and more than every team except Ireland. Some of his best performances were when he opened the bowling. He took 2 for 11 against Hong Kong, including the big scalp of Atkinson, and his 1 for 17 against Canada gave Nepal a chance for a massive upset on the final day of group play before they ultimately fell short.
Shakti is third highest wicket-taker of the tournament with 16 wickets altogether.
“I feel good to know it,” Paras commented. “There were criticism over Shakti’s inclusion but he proved himself.”