UAE take lead as Qatar & Bahrain register first wins in Asia “A” qualifiers

Pre-tournament favourites UAE are living up to their billing as they registered their second consecutive victory in the ICC Asia “A” qualifiers in Kuwait to take the lead in the points table. There were first wins registered by both Qatar and Bahrain as the points table gets busy with Kuwait and Saudi Arabia also on the same points after second round of group phase matches.

UAE also boosted their net run-rate by a big margin victory over Saudi Arabia as they beat them by 7 wickets and more then 6 overs to spare. While Saudi Arabia batted their entire quota of 20 overs, the total score of only 103 was never going to be enough to restrict the strong UAE batting line-up. Mohammad Naveed, Amir Hayat and Imran Haider picked up 7 wickets among them and captain Rohan Mustafa also helped himself to couple of wickets.

While Saudi Arabia managed to get both Chirag Suri and Rohan Mustafa dismissed cheaply, the partnership between opener Ashfaq Ahmed (46 n.o off 41) and Muhammad Usman (31 off 21) sealed the game for UAE.

Host’s Kuwait put up a brave fight against Qatar but fell short by 26 runs chasing a target of 168 set by Qatar, which was largely thanks to knocks played by Faisal Javid Khan (48 off 23) and Kamran Khan (49 off 28). Imran Ali was the star of the show with the ball for Kuwait as he picked up 3/18 off his four overs and was well supported by Sajid Ali (2/21 off 4), but the rest of the bowling line-up could not exert the same amount of pressure to restrict them even further.

Kuwait knocked off 84 runs in the 12th over with wicket-keeper opener Usman Waheed running havoc over Qatar bowlers but once he got out after smashing 66 runs of only 36 deliveries, the rest of the batting line-up could not live up to the challenge of achieving the required asking rate as Qatar bowlers reduced them to 104/7 in the 16th over. Kuwait eventually managed to post 141/9 and would be highly disappointed in not making a better effort at reaching the target.

Inam-ul-Haq picked up 4/22 of his four overs to be the pick of the bowlers for Qatar, while Awais Malik (1/19 off 4) and Iqbal Hussain (2/23 off 3) bowled economically to build up the pressure from the other end.

Maldives put up a much better showing against Bahrain and managed to take the match down to the wire as Bahrain chased the target of 141 set by them in the 20th over to win the match by 6 wickets. Sri Lankan born Nilantha Cooray played the anchor role for Maldives, opening the innings, as he scored 65 off 51 deliveries. Bahrain bowlers managed to pick up 5 wickets in the Maldives innings but the trio of Zeeshan Abbas (1/18 off 4), Mohamed Iqbal Noor (1/23 off 4) and Imran Anwar (1/24 off 4) bowled well in tandem in the middle and late overs to not let Maldives score those extra 15-20 runs, which could have been the difference maker in the end. Nevertheless, a good outing for Maldives considering this is only their 2nd International game.

Shahbaz Badar (56 off 43) and Yasser Nazir (24 off 33) provided good start to Bahrain as the pair put up 61 runs in the first 10 overs when Nazir got out. Maldives managed to pick up three more wickets and keep themselves in the game till the end but crucial cameos from Mohammad Sameer (20 n.o off 13), Imran Anwar (11 off 5) and Sikder Billah (15 n.o off 7) took Bahrain to their opening win in the qualifiers.

UAE look pretty settled at the top of the points table with all the action happening below them for the tussle for the final two qualification spots from Asia “A” qualifiers. Still a long way to go in the event and hopefully, some upsets or shocking wins here or there will make the points table even more interesting.