Nepal had to satisfy the fourth position on the ACC Women’s Twenty20 Championship 2011 after they lost to Thailand by 13 runs on the 3rd/4th position playoff match here at KEC, Kuwait Friday.
Winning the toss, Thailand elected to bat first. Nepal restricted Thailand for 76 runs in 17.5 overs. Pundarika Prathanmitr made a good start of the innings with 17 runs with two fours before she was caught by Neera Rajopadhyay on the ball of Rubina Chhetri.
Similarly, Sornnarin Tippoch made 12 runs, Nattakan Chantam made 10 runs to the Thailand’s scoreboard. Phira-on Kamla was duck out on the ball of Sarita Magar. Karuna Bhandari starred when she got the wicket of Nattaya Boochatham(15 off 23) and then a hattrick-Thippakorn Gatekam(6), Narumon Srisuwan(0), Nantanit Khonchan(0). 5 players of Thailand were all duck out. Supranan Hengrathok got duck out on the ball of Rubina Chhetri, Sirintra Saengsakaorat got duck out on the ball of Karuna Bhandari.
Rubina Chhetri and Rashmi Sharma claimed two wickets each with the figure of 4-0-20-2 and 3-0-7-2 respectively. Similarly, Sarita Magar took one wicket and Karuna Bhandari took five wickets with the figure of 3.5-0-12-5 along with a hattrick.
Nepal who went to chase the target of 77 runs made an average start. But it all flowed down when the first two wickets of Neera Rajopadhyay(12 off 15) and Sarita Magar(2 off 7) fell on the fourth over. And there was the partnership of 29 runs between Rashmi Sharma and Nary Thapa for the third wicket. But again the wickets started falling. Rashmi Sharma got out on 15, Nary Thapa on 9, Sarita Magar on 1 and Karuna Bhandari was duck out. Madhu Thapa made 3 runs before she was run out. Similarly Mamta Thapa, Manita Gautam added 1 run each and Manisha Rawal added 3 runs, Rubina Chhetri added 4* runs on Nepalese scoreboard before they were all out for 63 runs in 18.5 overs.
Nantanit Khoncham took 4 wickets for Thailand, Nattakan Chantam took 1, Phira-on Kamla took 3, Narumon Srisuwan took 1 and Nattaya Boochatham took 1 wicket to help Thailand to restrict Nepal on 63.
Nepal had defeated Thailand by 21 runs on the group satge match.
Nantanit Khonchan from Thailand was selected as the player of the match.
Rajesh KC for cricnepal
