India Under-19 lost their second match of the Asian Cricket Council’s U19 Youth Asia Cup by 19 runs to Nepal Under-19s. Chasing 186 runs, the Himanshu Rana-led team were bowled out for 166. The skipper, who opened the innings top-scored with 46 runs while Dipendra Airee and Co ran through the rest of the line-up. The cricketer earlier scored 88 runs to set India a modest target.
Electing to field first, India restricted the opposition to 185 for eight. While the rest of the line-up struggled to score off the Indian bowlers, Dipendra played a solid knock to help his side to a respectable score in the low-scoring game. Opener Jitendra Singh too played patiently as he posted 36 off 95 balls in an effort to set the innings on course. Dipendra then held one end up even as India struck at regular intervals.
Aditya Thakare and Abhishek Sharma claimed two wickets each while Vivekanand Tiwary, Mandeep Singh, Shiva Singh and Atharva Taide picked a wicket each.
Rana and Manjot Kalra then got India off to a decent start with a 65-run opening stand until the captain was bowled by Kamal Airee. 26 runs later, Taide was trapped lbw by Dipendra. India then continued to lose wickets at regular intervals and weren’t able to forge a solid partnership.
While Dipendra picked four wickets, Pawan Sarraf and Shahab Alam claimed two wickets each. Kamal and Sandeep Lamichhane chipped in with a wicket each to bowl India out with 11 balls to spare.
