Nepal Women’s cricket team faces daunting challenge in Global Qualifier

Nepal’s 2026 sporting calendar year  kicks off with the women’s national cricket team of  Nepal in action in the ICC Women’s Twenty20 Global Qualifier starting on January 18th in Kathmandu.

This is the first time Cricket  Association of Nepal(CAN) is hosting a women’s  international tournament of this magnitude and scale involving ten teams from across the world.  

The preliminary two group matches will be staged  simultaneously in  the International Tribhuvan University ground and Upper Mulpani cricket ground.

 

After the completion of the  round robin preliminary stage, the top three teams from each  group move to the Super Sixes.

 

The six teams will fight out for the four spots at stake in Super Sixes for a place in the championship round.

 

Nepal is in  Group  B alongside the Netherlands,Scotland,Thailand and Zimbabwe.

While Group A consists of Ireland, Papua New Guinea, Namibia and the United States of America.

Surprisingly, the tournament has not quite generated the kind of buzz, interest and excitement  everyone anticipated.

Let us hope that  with the start of the competition, cricket enthusiasts change gears and  turn out in large  numbers to rally around their team and make the sporting event a grand success.

Taking into consideration the  daunting challenge faced by Nepal, partisan support is indispensable. It helps  boost players morale,motivation and confidence to perform well.

Indu Barma in charge of the captaincy leads a very experienced and talented outfit that boasts players in the likes of  vice-captain Pooja Mahato, Rubina Chhetri , Sita Ran Magar  and many more.

 

Team Nepal has a new head coach in Indian national Harshal Pathak who was appointed not too long ago.

Highly experienced and successful Pathak with a proven record of personal success  made a name  for himself when  he took over the women’s national team of Thailand as head coach.

Although he had to work with the team from scratch,he transformed it into a  highly competitive side and totally changed the landscape of women’s cricket in Thailand.

Under his watch,the team improved by leaps and bounds. They qualified for their  maiden  2022 ICC World Cup Twenty20 and reached the semi-finals of the 2022 Asia Cup Twenty20.

Since his takeover of  Nepal,there is guarded optimism in the air.The million dollar question is, can he script a similar success story with the Nepali side?

It is very obvious that he will need the full backing  of CAN when it comes to his  demands in  order for him to  succeed in his role.Certainly, his ultimate goal is to take the team to  a  whole new level in terms of  performance, reshape,enhance  and redefine women’s  cricket. 

  

For now let us keep our fingers crossed and hope that he is able to reach another milestone in his career. Time will tell.

After creating history by qualifying for the Global  Qualifier for the first time,they are attempting to achieve bigger successes . Their ultimate goal is to make it to the championship  round of the ICC Women’s Twenty20 World Cup being hosted jointly by England and Wales later this year.

However,two major hurdles in the form of Global  Qualifiers and Super Sixes stand  in their way which they have to overcome in  order  to reach their goals.

Undoubtedly,they have a steep mountain to climb that demands  a great concerted effort,coupled with individual brilliance, determination,commitment,razor focus, consistency and highest endeavor.

They are pitted against tough opponents and cannot  afford to get complacent and insipid  at any time of the  competition .

They have to  be at their very best,rise to the occasion, put in every bit of effort and perform consistently  and to their  ability.

It is a big opportunity for the home team to make a lasting impact on the tournament and prove themselves as a rising force in world cricket.

They must go all out to make the most out of the home advantage to put  themselves in the driver’s  seat, providing them a chance to make it to the final round of the competition.

If they do  come  out trumps at the end of the day it would be the biggest achievement in the history of Nepal cricket.

For it to happen, they must  put in a consistently solid winning performance with both the bat and the  ball throughout the  championship.The fielding has to be  top notch as well.

The team’s batting which is fragile and inconsistent is key to their success. They have to overcome the shortcomings that have been impacting their batting performance.

The batters must significantly improve their performance and make every effort to come on top of their game.

Nepal’s  defeats against Ireland and the United States in warm up matches recently indicates that their path to  success  is intriguing and very challenging. 

There is still plenty of room for improvement, and they require hard and focused effort to be prepared on all fronts  when they take on Thailand in the opener on January 18th.

Let us hope that they perform well, come out firing on all cylinders and upset the applecart to emerge victorious.