Nepal ended third on group B points table with a NRR that was 0.000026 better than that of Scotland leaving them on fourth position. It has recently been revealed that it was faulty NRR estimates that resulted in Nepal pipping Scots for the third position, rather than the late blitz by Hamid Shah.
After posting 205 in 20 overs thanks to 90 from Matt Machan, who with that knock climbed to number one position for the leading run scorer for the tournament with 301 runs in 7 matches.
During the mid-innings break the Scots were told they would require to restrict Denmark to less than 121 in order to overhaul Nepal’s NRR and climb to third. The actual figure should have been 130.
Fortunately for Nepal the Denmark side posted exactly 130 runs. Denmark were were 114 at the end of the 19th over. Hamid Shah then scored sixes off the first two balls of Matt Machan, and four runs of the next three balls meant Scotland remained below Nepal in the points table.
After the first six by Hamid according to the report by CricketEurope.net, the Scotland captain, thinking they had only 1 run to defend ,apparently brought fielders inside the 30 yard circle to protect the single, which made the second six from Hamid a lot easier and risk free!
After the Scotland team got the real figures at the end of the they were “frustrated to the extreme”, reads William Dick’s report for Cricket Europe.
Scotland now have to win two matches(instead of one if they had finished third) to qualify for the World Cup.
