Malaysia Outclass Saudi Arabia In ACC U-19 Premier League Opening Match

By R. VIKNESWARAN KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 29 (Bernama) -- Malaysia started their Asian Cricket Council (ACC) Under-19 Premier League campaign in style by defeating Saudi Arabia in the opening match Friday. The Malaysian boys won the match by 181 runs at the Kinrara Cricket Academy, here and secured their first two points of the tournament. Saudi Arabia who won the toss and elected to field were unable to chase the 286 runs piled on by the home team. The visitors just managed to set 105 runs in 32 overs. S. Shankar was chosen as man of the match after hitting 52 runs and claiming five wickets while Nik Nazran Nik Anuay managed 51 runs not out. Coach Thushara Prabath Kodikara who praised his boys for the outstanding performance warned them to be prepared for a more challenging match against Kuwait at the Bayuemas Oval in Klang (in Malaysian Selangor state) Saturday. "Today's (Friday) match was a little easy for us. Our players got some good runs and we had a good opening partnership between Shankar and Virandeep Singh. We batted well, bowled well and fielding was also good...We got good pace, from there we build up the innings," he told Bernama. Meanwhile, at the Kelab Aman Oval, defending champions Afghanistan beat Kuwait by 8 wickets with 206 balls remaining and Nepal defeated United Arab Emirates (UAE) by 149 runs at the Bayuemas Oval. After Saturday's match against Kuwait, Malaysia would face Nepal on Monday (Aug 31), UAE on Tuesday (Sept 1) and Afghanistan on Thursday (Sept 3) at the six nation league based championship. For the record, Malaysia finished last year's edition in Kuwait in fourth place behind Afghanistan, Nepal, and UAE with four points after winning two of the five games played. -- BERNAMA