Region No 8 (Pokhara) has crashed out of the Wai Wai U-19 National Cricket Tournament while Region No 3 (Kathmandu) and Region No 2 (Birgunj) made winning starts to their campaigns.
Pokhara crashed out at the group stage with a match in hand after suffering its third successive defeat. This time, at the hands of Region No 4 (Bhairahawa) in Group B match. Bhairahawa recorded a convincing 118-run victory over Pokhara at the Army ground in Bhaktapur for its first win in two matches.
Glimpse of the match between Kathmandu and Biratnagar in Wai-Wai U-19 National Championship
In Group A, Kathmandu overcame Region No 1 (Biratnagar) by three wickets at the Pulchowk Engineering College ground and Birgunj defeated Region No 6 (Baitadi) by eight wickets to collect two points each from their opening matches.
At the Bhaktapur ground, Rupesh Bastola stole the show cracking 52 runs and claiming three wickets for Bhairahawa. Electing to bat first Bhairahawa was all out for 189 runs in 47.1 overs and bowled out Pokhara for 71 runs in 34 overs.
Player-of-the-match Bastola struck 10 fours and a six during his knock of 48 balls. Susan Bhari scored 40 off 79, Bijay Sunar made 13 and Dipendra Yadav remained not out on 21.
Nischal Pandey of Pokhara claimed three wickets, with Shyam Tripathi and Sangharsha Paudyal taking two each.
Akash Thapa (11) and Krishna Gurung (10) were the only players to reach double figures, with four Pokhara batsmen dismissed without scoring. Bastola and Dipendra Yadav took three wickets each to restrict Pokhara to a meager total.
At the Pulchowk ground, Prakash Bista (B) claimed five wickets for Kathmandu and skipper Bibhatshu Thapa smashed an unbeaten 58 runs to seal a comfortable win over Biratnagar.
Winning the toss Biratnagar opted to bat first and was bowled out for 158 runs in 45.3 overs.Somesh Yadav topscored for Biratnagar with 40. Mukunda Yadav made 34 while Rohit Singh and Puran Bishwakarma added 22 runs each.
Player-of-the-match Bista (B) of Kathmandu claimed five wickets giving away 31 runs in his 10 overs. In the run-chase Kathmandu reached the target in 30.4 overs. Skipper Thapa hit eight fours and one six in his 41-ball knock. Similarly, Prakash Bista-A (10), Ashish Dhami (11) and Sarad Khadka (15) were the other contributors.
Siddhanta Lohani and Hemanta Rai bagged two wickets each.At the TU ground in Kirtipur, chasing a target of 140 runs set by Baitadi, Birgunj made 141 runs with eight wickets in hand in 31.2 overs.
Birgunj opener Anil Kumar Sah scored 17 and Amit Shrestha made 40, while Suraj Prasad Kurmi and Arif Sheikh were unbeaten on 35 and 40 respectively. Sheikh won the player-of-the-match award.
Earlier, Yogendra Karki played a patient knock of 52 from 111 after Baitadi elected to bat first. Karki was bowled by Ram Naresh Giri. Dilip Nath (19), Saroj Rawal (10) and Prem Tamang (11) were the other batsmen to reach double figures.