Nepali national cricket team suffered yet another huge defeat in its Sri Lanka tour as Sri Lanka U-23 thrashed Nepal by 133 runs on Thursday in the second practice match of the tour. Nepal had lost to the same team by seven wickets on Wednesday.
Sri Lanka U-23 put up 254/9 at NCCA Cricket Ground, Colombo as opener Shehan Jayasuriya scored 42 runs off 47 balls and Danushka Gunathilaka garnered 39 runs off 68 balls. Niroshan Dickwella (25 runs off 34 balls), Romesh Buddhika (38 runs off 41 balls) contributed for Sri Lanka in the middle order while Chathuranga Kumara scored 48 runs off 56 balls and Charith Jayapanthi struck unbeaten 29 runs off nine balls to put up a huge total against Nepal at down the order.
Nepali bowlers Avinash Karn, Ram Naresh Giri, Sagar Pun, Shakti Gauchan, Basant Regmi and Prithu Baskota took a wicket each.
Chasing the huge total, Nepal was all out for 122 runs in 40.1 overs. Nepal lost opener Subash Khakurel in the very first ball of the innings but his opening partner Ani Kumar Mandal tried to anchor the Nepali innings scoring 51 runs off 99 balls. Nepal lost Mahesh Chhetri (3 runs), skipper Paras Khadka (naught), Binod Bhandari (naught) and Sharad Vesawkar (1 run) in quick succession. Prithu Baskota resisted Sri Lankan attack for a while scoring 22 runs off 35 balls. Shakti Gauchan scored unbeaten 21 runs off 29 balls but Nepal was all out for 122 runs as Basant Regmi (7 runs), Sagar Pun (5 runs) and Rahul Kumar Vishwakarma (2 runs) could not resist Sri Lankan bowling for a long.
Lahiru Jayaratna took four wickets for Sri Lanka U-23 while Chathuranga Kumara claimed two wickets.
Nepali team has been in 14-day tour of Sri Lanka ahead of ACC Emerging Teams Cup. The national team is scheduled to fly to Singapore from Sri Lanka to take part in the ACC Emerging Teams Cup to be held from August 17 to 25. Nepal is slated along side India, Pakistan and Afghanistan in the tournament, where Asian Test playing nations are to send their U-23 teams.