Nepal vs Mongolia, Asian Games Men's T20I 2023, Today Match Prediction 27 September 2023

nep vs mgl Match Prediction & Analysis

Nepal will be confident coming into this tournament after their recent success in ODIs as they reached the Asia Cup and competed against strong teams like India and Pakistan. 

They played their last T20I in 2022 on their tour of Kenya where they emerged victorious with a 3-2 series win. Nepal will be playing Mongolia and Maldives in the Group Stage of the Asian Games Men’s T20I. 

Skipper Rohit Paudel should be backing his team to win both these games and reach the Quarter-Final where they would face one of the four teams (India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh). There are some changes to this Nepal squad with no Arjun Saud, Pawan Sarraf, and Gyanendra Malla who were part of the T20I squad against Kenya.

Mongolia haven’t announced their squad yet, and there is not information available on their past performances since they’ve never played any international cricket. However, we will be making some speculations on who could probably feature in the Mongolia squad based on their domestic T20 league.

TEAMS PREVIEW

Nepal Preview

Rohit Paudel will be leading Nepal in the Asian Games Men’s T20Is 2023. There will be new openers leading this batting order this time around. Kushal Bhurtel and wicket-keeper batsman Aasif Sheikh are the likely contenders for the openers positions in the batting order.

These two opened the innings against India in the recent Asia Cup and were very impressive with a 65-run opening stand against the Men in Blue. The batting lineup for this Asian Games tournament will look a lot different from their last series against Kenya. 

While skipper Rohit Paudel and batting all-rounder Dipendra Singh Airee will be seen in the middle-order, Aarif Sheikh, Gyananedra Malla, or Pawan Sarraf. Instead, wicket-keeper batter Binod Bhandari and bowling all-rounder Kushal Malla could make it to numbers 5 and 6 followed by Lalit Rajbanshi. 

In the lower-order, right-arm fast-medium bowler Sompal Kami is a handy batter and can add some crucial runs at the death. Rohit Paudel should take responsibility in the middle-order and play a captain’s knock which he failed to do in the Asia Cup.

Nepal will need some crucial partnerships from the top 4 batters. In the bowling attack, Sandeep Lamichhane will be the key player and could trouble the Mongolian batters in their debut T20I match. Karan KC and Sompal Kami are other key bowlers to watch out for in this squad.

Nepal Predicted Playing XI:

Kushal Bhurtel, Aasif Sheikh (wk), Rohit Paudel (c), Dipendra Singh Airee, Binod Bhandari, Kushal Malla, Lalit Rajbanshi, Sompal Kami, Karan KC, Sandeep Lamichhane, Abinash Bohara

Mongolia Preview

We shall make it clear at the outset that there is no information available on Mongolia’s squad or any past performances since they have never played a T20 international match. However, Mongolia has an active domestic circuit and there have been some promising performances in the Men’s T20 National League, Mongolia in July of this year.

Raz Nader, Mohan, Hitesh Upadhyay, and Atul are among the best-performing batters in the Tiger team of the Men’s T20 National League. Tiger were unbeaten in the league with 6 wins from 7 matches. Mohan and Atul were also among the top wicket-takers for Tiger.

The second best-performing team in this league was the Darkhan-Uul men’s team.  While their batters did not have great strike rates, their bowlers were quite impressive. Lutbayr Od, B.MunkhOrgil, and G.Sodbileg were exceptional with the ball for Darkhan-Uul. 

The top performers from the top two ranked teams in the Men’s T20 National League of Mongolia are among the more consistent and promising T20 players to come out of Mongolia. Just to reiterate, there is no information on the squads and possible XI for this team.

However, as a speculation, we could say that some of the above-mentioned players can possibly make it to the squad.

Mongolia Predicted Playing XI:

No information on the Mongolia squad is available.

PITCH AND WEATHER CONDITIONS

Weather Conditions

The pitch is batting-friendly but also offers help for the spinners and as such Sandeep Lamichhane will be a key player for Nepal. The weather will be partly cloudy with a high of 30 degrees Celsius at the time of the match in Hangzhou.

Venue Details

Pingfeng Campus Cricket Field in Hangzhou will be the venue for this and all the matches in this tournament. The team batting first should be looking for a 150+ runs score to be in a competitive position in the contest. The average 1st innings score here is quite low but considering Nepal’s batting strength, we reckon they could easily chase down anything below 130 runs.

Toss: To Bat

It is a good venue for batting and Nepal will like to get used to the surface by letting their batters have a go in their opening game of the tournament. Though chasing is also quite a good option, batting first will be on the minds of both skippers.