By Grockle
October 19 2026

In the year's of covering Oman and Associate cricket, I have never seen Oman beat Nepal livein a gameIwas at or watched.  Today is a game Oman really NEED to win if they want to make a serious challenge for a place in the 2027 ODI World Cup by qualifying as a top CWC Top four side.  Nepal are presently in seventh place hoping to leapfrog Canada with a win but Oman in fourth position need to capitalise on the fact that they still have 4 games to play while those around them have completed their 36 games - especially Namibia.  Nepal win the toss and will bat first on a wicket where all the games have been won by the team batting first  

CWC Tri-Tournament - Oman v Nepal @ Al Amerat Oman Monday 19 October 2026

Nepal win the toss and choose to bat first on a wicket where the teams batting first have had a distinct advantage and usually the winning points.  The Oman side sees Shah Faisal returning to the side to open the bowling while Nepal will open the batting with Dev Khanal coming in for the injured Arjun Kumal

The Oman side sees a number of returnees;

Jatinder Singh, Hasnain Ul Wahab, Hammad Mirza, Mijubir Ali, Vinyat Shukla (c & w), Sanju Sanjeev, Jay Odedra, Shah Faisal, Hassnain Shah, Shakeel Ahmed, Samay Shrivastava 

Dev Khanal and Aasif Sheikh open the last game with the bat against Shah Faisal taking the first new ball from the Academy end of the Al Amerate ground.A brace a two run spurts sees the new Nepal bat off the mark with 5 fro the first over.  As usual, Oman turn to spin at home immediately as Shakeel Ahmed opens his morning account from the supporters stand end of the ground.  Sheikh also gets off the mark with a single and the batting side move to 8 after 2.

The first boundary comes in the third over as Khanal sends Faisal  to the boundary for the first time but the early moments suggest the Nepalese are confident against an experienced Omani new ball attack that willnot be afraid to try a few things.

The first breakthrough comes at the end of the 5th over when Aasif Sheik almost apologetically clips Faisal to the mid wicket fielder Ul Wahab who gratefully accepts the catch to send the bat on his way for 7 from 13 at 19 for 1.  it almost comes a a surprise because there didn't seem to be anything particular about the ball - there certainly wasn't anything stunning about the shot!  Ishan Pandey replaces his unfortunate colleague.

As we move towards the end of the 'Powerplay', Jay Odedra takes the 9th replacing Faisal and Pandey finally gets off the mark in that over.  The score reaches 24 for 1 after an Ahmed maiden finishes the 'Powerplay' phase of the innings and the fielding plan changes.

The batting pair start to move forward as a scoring partnership as we reach the 15th over.  Hassnain Shah has replaced Ahmed after 6 overs and he is now in tandem with Odedra who is bowling a very frugal spell.  He finishes the 15th (his fourth) and doubles the runs he has conceded with 7 in the over, the last ball producing a caught and bowled attempt that just spins off the bowler's fingers.  41 for 1 after 15 with Khanal providing the majority of the early runs as he moved into the 30's.

The Nepal 50 arrives in the second half of the 16th from a Khanal single that takes him to 33 from 45 while his partner has moved into double figures with 10 from 35 balls faced. Hassnain Shah is also working on a tight line which means the boundaries are hard to find from both ends against this attack.

After 20 overs, the batting pair have moved past a 50 partnership and taken the score to 71 for 1.  Pandey is starting to contribute to the scoring rate, catching up with Khanal who has become a little 'becalmed' in the 30's.  He does change that a little with the first six of the innings off Shah at the start of the 21st over.

Oman have brought in Shrivasava for this game.  They start to use him in the early overs of the 20's and he breaks the 2nd wicket partnership in the 22nd over as he fools Pandey, getting the ball past him as he comes forward and Shukla does the rest as he can't get back.  He is stumped at 83 for 2 for 29 from 60 balls.  The next man in is Rohit Paudel.  Dev Khanal goes to 50 from 60 balls in the next over at 88 for 2 with 3 fours and a six in the knock.

Mujabir Ali takes the game to the 25th over (on earlier than usual) with his first outing of the day and Nepal reach the halfway point at 99 for 2.  They don't reach the 3 figure amrk with the present partnership as Shrivastava repeats his feat of fooling the bat when Khanal comes up the wicket to drive the first ball of the 26th handsomely only to find the ball is not there, it is in the hands of the keeper and he is stumped for 57 from 65 balls at 99 for 3.

Dipendra Singh Airee arrives at the crease and his first run on the board sends his side to 100 for 3.  In the 30th over he produces the second Nepalese six off Shrivastrava  pushing the score to 124 for 3 which suggests the 250 is on from the visitors, a score the Omani's have struggled to get anywhere near batting second on this wicket in the last fortnight.

Bowling wise, Shah is not having a good day having given away 29 runs from his 4 overs, Shavastrava has not been all that tight but he has two wickets from his 7 for 35. The other bowlers have been much tighter though Ali has yet to have enough over to make that assessment (1 for 7).  Nepal will be looking to push forwatrd now with two bats with a reputation for pushing the score along and Gulsan Jha in the dressing room ready to take over if one this pair should fail.  Oman will need to chase better today than they have been able to do so far if they want the points from this one.

Airee provides another six as he takes a liking to Ali and moves his side near to 150 at the end of the 33rd over.  The 150 does arrive with a Paudel single in the 34th oer off the bowling of Shah while Ahmed returns for the 35th to look to hold the Nepalese in check having onlyu gone for 19 runs from the 8 overs bowled sofar.  He will bowl out in the next few while hopefully putting the brakes on the scoring at the same time.

With 15 to go, Nepal are 156 for 3 with Airee looking dangerous scoring at more than a run a ball.  Ahmed bowled out for 29 runsand with the 38th over Oman look to bowl out Shrivatava with the extra hope that he will removeoneof the two present Nepal bats in the process as they take on the tricky spinner.  He finishes his8th over at 2 for 40 with the visitors on 177 fro 3 with 11 overs remaining in this half of the contest.  Odedra also returns to finish his bowling work taking the 40th (his 8th at 0 for 28) Singh Airee goes to 50 with a six from his second ball to reach 52 from 46 balls with 3 fours and 3 sixes.  He is looking dangerous as Nepal reach 187 for 3 with 10 overs of the innings remaining.  They collapsed alittel against Canada 2 days ago but if they keep this up they may well bat Oman outof this game before they start their reply!!.

Paudel also reaches 50 in the 42nd with a single off Shah and his 61st ball. He has only 1 boundary in that, a six so it has been a real supportive innings so far. it comes just after he sends the ball away for two to bring up his side's 200, two runs that nearly ended with a run out.  Had the throw in been better it would have seen Paudel returning to the dressing room but it was wayward and took Shuklah too far away from the wicket to make the break in the stumps.  His throw missed and the bats got home.

With 5 overs leftit is 238 for 3 with Airee in full flow and Oman bring back Faisal for his 'death' bowling last few overs (he has only bowled 5 while Shah has leaked runs and been preferred is a small seam attack.  He gets Airee to flash at one and Shukla takes a regulation caught behind to send the Nepal talisman back to the hutch for 69 from 62 (3 fours and 4 sixes) with the first ball of the 46th.  That brings Gulshan Jha to the crease and the new pair take 10 off the rest of the over with a boundary each in that score.  They move within sniffing distance of 250 with 4 overs to go. 

Odedra takes the 47th.  Jha takes him on and dies in the deep as he does not get enough of the big hit and is caught by Sajeev for 5 from 4 without getting his side over 250.   249 for 5 brings in the big hitting KC who takes a single to get the 250 on the board.

In the 48th, KC is so keen to get somebat on Faisal's deliveries thah he swings to flamboyantly and hits his own wicket. He leavs for 9 off 4 at 261 for 6 and is replaced by Basir Ahamad.  Paudel gets back on strikein the 49th and wants to push the score along but he gets a Faisal ball too highon his bat and it goes up rather than going out.  He is caught in the deep by Shah off the bowling of Odedra for a superb 80 from 81 balls (2 sixes and 2 fours) with the score on 265 for 7.  His partnership withAiree has probably won this game for the visitors.  The skipper Sandeep Lamichhane is the next man in and after a top edge to Mirza off his first ball he is the next man out for 0 at the same score!!  Odedra finishes his 10 oves with a solid 3 for 44.  However, there is still cricket to be played and Nandan Yadav walks out to play it!!

But it is Ahamad who goes mad!!  He hits 17 off 7 balls with 14 of those coming from the first 3 ballsof the last over before he is caught going for another boundary by the sub fielder Karan Sonavale at 279 for 8.  Rajbanshi comes out as the last man and the last pair add 1 before Yadav is out to the first ball he faces shovelling the ball to Sonavale and giving Faisal a well deserved 5-fer with 5 for 57 from his 8 overs.  Nepal are all out for 280 and you have to think that 281 is well beyond what Oman can produce against this Nepalese side.

The Reply

Yadav shows Ul Wahab and Singh how diffiuclt it will be with his first over which goes for 4 runs.  Karan KC confirms it with his second after which both Omani openers have played and missed and the score has moved on to 6 without loss.   Presently the RRR is less than 6 but it will rise quickly as the overs go by unless the bats get into a rhythm by scoring consistently and regularly.  Hitting the occasional boundary makes thescore seem to be moving but the momentum is not smooth and the ability to accelerate later in the innings is never reall there because bats never really get into the flow of accumulating runs.

After 4 overs they have doubled their score but that means they have 12 which is half of where they need the score to be to be up with the rate.  It is not that much of a problem presently.  It becomes a problem IF Oman pass 10 overs with a score of less than 40-ish.