Sanjam Regmi scored a half-century and took three wickets as Region No 2 Birgunj defeated Region No 5 Nepalgunj by 58 runs at the TU Ground.
Birgunj scored 197/7 in 50 overs with Sanjam scoring unbeaten 56 and Shovakant Pandey getting another half-century of the innings. Nepalgunj opener Mahesh Chhetri continued his good form for 52 but rest of the batsmen failed as they were bowled out for 139 in 45.3 overs.
Apart from Sanjam who gave away 23 runs in 8.3 overs, Murtaza Hawari also claimed three wickets while Binod Das and Kumar Prasun took a wicket each. Binod is now a wicket shy of becoming only the second bowler in the national league to take 50 wickets behind Raju Basnet.
Mahesh 113-ball knock produced four boundaries and was seventh wicket to fall making it 106/7 in 36 overs. Navin Shahi (19 not out), Nirmal KC (14) and Meraj Ansari (12) hit a few runs towards the end.
Earlier, Birgunj lost the momentum after a good start. Anil Mandal (17) and Shovakant (52) added 65 for first wicket but then Birgunj lost wickets in quick succession to go down 90/6 – thanks to 4/19 of Nirmal. In the 37th over, they were 110/7 with every possibility of bundling out below 150.
But Sanjam and Vinay Shah then rescued the team with unbeaten 87 run partnership – a national record breaking Bhairahawa’s Dipesh Khatri and Antim Thapa’s 59 against Nepalgunj in 2006 as Birgunj race dto a defendable total.
On Tuesday, Region No 1 Biratnagar plays Nepalgunj at TU and Region No 4 Bhairahawa takes on Nepalgunj at IOE Groud.