Under 19 Cricket World Cup – Division 2 – Asia

Match 4 Hong Kong v Maldives @ Prem Tinsulanonda International School

Heading into the final Group B fixture, Hong Kong knew that a victory would see them progress into the Semi-finals of the competition.Arriving at the ground that had had a lot of overnight rain it looked very doubtful of any play all. The umpires decided that an early lunch would be taken at 12pm. During the long morning delay and lunch interval the sun had a real sting in it and provided some good drying conditions. After lunch the umpires decided that the pitch had dried enough for the game to start at 1:45pm. The overs had been reduced to 28 overs per side.
Hong Kong won the toss and had no hesitation inviting the Maldives to bat first on what looked a slow soft wicket. Bowling plans had been put in place and again the partnership of Mohammad Hassan and Vikas Sharma started in emphatic fashion. Maldives found scoring incredibly hard and a mix up by the batters in the first over followed by another wicket bowled the very next ball put Hong Kong in the driving seat. Three overs in Maldives were facing an uphill battle at 0/3. Hong Kong did not let up and after 10 overs Maldives were 10/3, Vikas Sharma having impressive figures of 5-4-1-1.
With survival the main aim rather than scoring Hong Kong kept ringing the changes in the bowling attack which led to Dhananjay Rao taking the next wicket with Maldives 13/4 off 14 overs.
Maldives batsman Ahmed Raid decided it was time to take the fight to Hong Kong hitting 3 impressive boundaries in one Rao over, doubling the score to 32/4. Hong Kong Captain, Adit Gorawara made some good tactical changes with the field and reintroduced the left arm spin of Mohammad Hassan. This decision paid off with Hassan taking the wicket of Raid for 17 and Maldives 39/5. Hassan finished his spell of bowling 6-2-4-2.
A double bowling change by Hong Kong saw Urslan Abdul and Mehran Zeb forge the perfect partnership and the next 5 of Maldive’s wickets fell for just 9 runs. Urslan finishing with figures of 3-0-7-2 and Mehran Zeb’s figures 3-1-3-3, including a stunning one-handed return catch.This collapse meant Hong Kong now knew 49 runs would guarantee a place in the semi-final.
Hong Kong made a change at the top of their batting order and promoted Dhananjay Rao to open after his excellent and patient match winning innings against Bahrain. This proved the perfect combination. Rao rotated strike well with Kalhan Challu, enabling Kalhan to play his flowing natural game. Two destructive blows over mid-wicket for 6 by Kalhan Challu in a Man of the Match innings set the tone and Maldives had no answer. Hong Kong were over the winning line in the 11th over, 49/0, Rao 11 not out and Challu 28 not out.
That win sees the Hong Kong team travel to Bangkok, to play their Semi Final game on Sunday against Oman, who topped Group B. The other Semi-Final sees runners up of Group A, Qatar play, winners of Group B, Kuwait.
The two teams that make it to the Final will secure a place in the Division 1 Qualifiers to be held in April 2019.