Nepal has announced preliminary squad of 20 men for the round 7 matches of the ICC World Cricket League Championship against the UAE. The squad (from 28 members) was declared on the basis of the performance in the closed camp held from 10th of November.
Nepal will play the round 7 matches of the championship against the UAE on 6th and 8th of December at the Sheikh Zayed Stadium, Abu Dhabi. Before playing against the UAE, Nepal is also set to play against the USA on 1st of December and against Kenya on 3rd of December.
The selection committee comprising of ICC Representative Aminul Islam, Captain Paras Khadka and Coach Jagat Tamata announced the preliminary squad.
Saurabh Khanal and Mehboob Alam missed out of the squad due to injury. Alam is currently recovering from his back injury while Khanal took his name back before the squad announcement due to knee injury. Khanal, reporting to WicketNepal revealed that he didn’t want to take any risk with the injury. He was also out of the 2016 U-19 World Cup squad due to the same injury.
Preliminary Squad of 20 :
1. Paras Khadka (Captain)
2. Gyanendra Malla
3. Sharad Vesawkar
4. Basanta Regmi
5. Sompal Kami
6. Sagar Pun
7. Binod Bhandari (Wicket-Keeper)
8. Karan K.C
9. Sushil Kandel
10. Hasim Ansari
11. Shakti Gauchan
12. Siddhant Lohani
13. Anil Kumar Shah
14. Lalit Singh Bhandari
15. Mohammad Aarif Sheikh
16. Dipendra Singh Airee
17. Sandeep Lamichhane
18. Jitendra Mukhiya
19. Kushal Bhurtel
20. Dilip Nath (Wicket-Keeper)
Naresh Budayair, Anil Mandal, Sushan Bhari, Sunil Dhamala, Rohit Kumar Paudel and Aasif Sheikh failed to make it to the top 20. Previously, Rohit, Aasif and Anil Kumar Shah made it to the closed camp after their impressing performance in the U19 team.
Anil Shah’s brilliant performance in the recently concluded U19 Asia Cup backed him to make it to the 20. He also scored a half century against Afghanistan in the Semi-Finals.
Siddhant Lohani, the T20 specialist batsman who impressed Nepalese fans with his attacking performance against Jersey in the ICC T20 World Cup Qualifier 2015 held in Scotland also made it to the squad.
Dilip Nath, who failed to make it to the squad against championship match against Hong Kong due to back injury, has made a comeback into the squad this time around while veteran spinner Shakti Gauchan, who was out of the squad against Hong Kong due to illness, has also made a comeback into the team.
Both the matches between the UAE and Nepal will only be played for pride as the results will not affect the out-comings of the championship qualification. Nepal, after gaining only 1 point from the last 2 matches against Hong Kong was relegated to division 2.
ICC World Cricket League Division 2 will be held on February in Namibia. The top 2 teams from Division 2 will qualify through to the ICC world cup qualifiers to be held in Zimbabwe on March, 2018.
