India U19 openers brushed aside their slow start to the tournament with a blazing show against Nepal U19 to power the team to a commanding seven-wicket win in their final Group D match of the ICC U19 World Cup. Wicketkeeper-batsman Rishabh Pant slammed 78 from just 24 balls while captain Ishan Kishan scored 52 off 40 balls as India overcame Nepal’s moderate 170 runs target with 179 balls to spare.
Pant, who had smashed 57 against New Zealand, made his intentions clear when he slogged the first ball of the Indian innings to the mid-wicket boundary. He continued to attack the new ball bowlers as India crossed 50 runs in just four overs. While Rishabh spared nobody, he was particularly aggressive against medium-pacer Dipendra Singh Airee. In just the four balls that he faced, Rishabh smashed three sixes and a boundary en route to registering the fastest U19 half-century in just 18 balls.
He was on course for a century before off-spinner Prem Tamang’s flighted ball dipped on him and crashed into his stumps. Tamang gave a glimpse of his talent when he also removed one-drop Ricky Bhui for seven. Kishan, who raised his fifty in 36 balls, was the third to go, but with just 28 more runs required, Armaan Jaffer and Sarfaraz Khan took India home with the latter hitting a straight six.
The last league game also provided India with a chance to fine tune their combination ahead of the knockouts. Having batted first in the two previous games, India got an opportunity to test their chasing skills against Nepal. With the quarter final place assured, the playing XI was also tweaked with Shubham Mavi and Mayank Dagar coming in for Rahul Batham and Zeeshan Ansari.
However, for lanky pacer Avesh Khan, it was business as usual as he set the tone yet again early on in the match. Striking on the final ball of the opening over, Avesh sent opener Sunil Dhamala back for a duck. Two overs later, Avesh picked his second victim when Yogendra Karki’s wide slash only resulted in his stumps getting uprooted. A brief partnership later, Nepal lost their third wicket when left-arm spinner Dagar was rewarded for his tight bowling. Dagar removed Nepal captain Raju Rijal, who was caught brilliantly in the slips by Sarfaraz.
With the pitch offering excessive turn, Kishan relied on his slow bowlers Dagar (2/32), Mahipal Lomror (8-0-20-0) and Washington Sundar (2/20), who did an excellent job of restricting Nepal to just 169/8. The match that was reduced to 48 overs due to foggy conditions that delayed the start of play.
Having topped Group D, India will now play their quarter final match against the team that finishes in second from Group A on Saturday.
Brief scores: Nepal U19 169/8 in 48 over (Rajbir Singh, Avesh Khan 3/34, Washington Sundar 2/20) lost to India U19 175/3 in 18.1 overs (Rishabh Pant 78, Ishan Kishan 52, Prem Tamang 2/41) by 7 wickets
