Nadir Karim is bowled
Left-arm seamer Mahaboob Alam produced an extraordinary record-breaaking performance at Grainville on Sunday, taking all ten wickets at a cost of 12 runs as Mozambique were bowled out for 19 in 14.5 overs.
It was the first ten-wicket haul in an associates/affiliates international, and overtakes the previous best analysis, Deubu Eliaba's nine for 16 for the Cook Islands against New Caledonia at Apia in 2002.
Alam had previously taken eight for 23 against the Maldives at Kathmandu in 2003, and seven for three when Nepal dismissed Myanmar for 10 in Kuala Lumpur in 2006. He now has three of the top six analyses in associates and affiliates internationals, and becomes the fourth cricketer at this level to take all ten, joining JB King (Philadelphia), TS Gilbert (Bermuda) and K Saker (Malaysia).
Alam was on a hat-trick three times in the course of his 7.5 overs, and finished off the innings with four wickets – three of them bowled – in six balls.
He bowled straight and full throughout his spell, and four of his victims were out leg-before.
Remarkably, in the first attempt to play the match on Saturday, in which Mozambique had been bowled out for 70 before the rain descended, Alam had contributed a wicketless five-over spell as Binod Das and Basant Regmi each collected five-wicket hauls.
But on Sunday he was not to be denied, and the Mozambicans had no answer to his mastery of line and length. There were no fewer than nine ducks in the Mozambique innings, with only Syed Shah (9) and Shoaib Younus (2 not out) getting off the mark.
Mozambique were chasing a Nepalese total of 238 for seven, which represented a good recovery after they had been 30 for three at one stage. Imtiyaz Lili picked up two wickets and Aasif Koliya one, but then Shakti Gauchan and Gyanendra Malla restored the innings with a fourth-wicket stand of 73.
Gauchan went for 34, but Malla continued in partnership with Paras Khadka, adding 80 for the fifth wicket.
Khadka was the next to go, after making 44 off 50 balls with two fours and a six, and Malla was finally out for 71, made from 101 balls with four boundaries.
Alam and Basant Regmi pushed the total up to 234, and it had reached 238 by the close.
Koliya was the most successful of the Nepalese bowlers with three for 49.
The Nepalese total always seemed likely to be too much for Mozambique, but nobody could have reckoned with Alam’s unbelievable achievement. There wasn’t too much doubt about who would win the Man of the Match award.