“Winning 11 out of 12 games was a surprise,” said Nepal captain Aasif Sheikh he wants his team to keep going in the ODI World Cup qualifier.

Aasif Sheikh thinks that Nepal can keep the momentum going from their amazing run to the World Cup Qualifier 2023, which starts in Zimbabwe.

The Aasif Sheikh team won 11 of their last 12 games to finish third in League 2 of the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup. They qualified for the next round with a close 9-run (DLS) win over the UAE as the light was going out. That made people happy in Kirtipur, but Sheikh knows that his side needs to work hard now if they want to make more history and be the main event.

Sheikh said, “I couldn’t believe I made it to the qualifier.” “To be honest, I didn’t expect to win 11 out of 12 games. It was a group effort, and everyone did their part. I think that our cricket is going in a great direction, and we are all very excited for the playoffs. So many of the League Two games we’ve played have been close, and we’ve done well in those games, so they’ll give us some confidence.

Nepal finished third in League Two, behind Scotland and Oman, with 19 wins out of 36 games. They will now face the hosts, Zimbabwe, as well as the West Indies, who have won the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup twice.

In the next few weeks, the last two spots at the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup 2023 will be up for grabs. Nepal will have to get used to playing without their loud home crowd, which helped them beat the UAE.

“The support we got in Nepal was amazing, and there were so many people at the final game.” We will miss the crowd, but we know that they will back us from Nepal. No matter where we play, we know that the people of Nepal are with us and that they will cheer for us from Nepal.

“Taking a look at the qualifiers, we think that if we play good cricket, we will win most of the games. All you have to do is play the best cricket you can that day. We believe we will win if we play our best cricket on that day.”

Aasif Sheikh won the ICC Spirit of Cricket Award for 2022 because he didn’t run out Ireland’s Andy McBrine when the bowler fell down while trying to run during a T20I between the two teams. His brother, all-rounder Aarif Sheikh, is also on the team. Head coach Monty Desai has faith in the players who helped them get to the qualifier and the Asia Cup in September.

“The day he [Desai] came in as coach, we sat together,” Sheikh said. “We had a meeting, and he said we’d win 10 out of 12 games. Then we won 11 of them.” This is how much faith and trust he had in us. Before we got into the Asia Cup, he said that we would be there. He’s a great guy who works hard with us and makes us think we can win every game.

How they were able to

When head coach Monty Desai took over, Nepal was in last place in the Cricket World Cup League 2. They needed to win 11 of their last 12 games to have a chance of making it to Zimbabwe, and they did. Even though Asif Khan scored a century in 42 balls, Nepal beat the UAE by nine runs on DLS as the light was going out and the crowd was getting loud.

World Cup statistics

Nepal has never been to an ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup, and they were eliminated from the 2019 Men’s T20 World Cup Qualifier Group Stage because of their net run rate. So far, the ICC Men’s T20 World Cup in 2014 was the only big ICC event they’ve taken part in.

Keep an eye on

In September 2021, when he was 15 years old, Gulsan Jha played his first ODI match against the USA. This made him the third-youngest man to ever play in an ODI. He has become a very important part of the team. In May, he hit an unbeaten 67 to help Nepal beat the USA by seven wickets and earn a spot at the Asia Cup in 2023.

When are they going to play?

Nepal’s first game is against the hosts, Zimbabwe, on June 18. After that, they play the USA on June 20, the West Indies on June 22, and the Netherlands on June 24.