U19 World Cup | India reach quarterfinals, Australia register big win over Scotland

India Under-19 team registered a convincing victory even after not playing with their two regular players in captain Yash Dhull and vice-captain Shaik Rasheed. The Indian team defeated Ireland by a huge margin of 174 runs to confirm their berth in the quarter-finals of the tournament. 

In another game, Australia also defeated minnows Scotland comprehensively to get their net run rate up and stay in the fight to march to the quarterfinals in the group death. Australia have won two of their games, but lost to Sri Lanka which is yet to play West Indies.

Harnoor Angkrish shine in India win

India were dealt a huge blow just ahead of the start of their Group B fixtures against Ireland as six of their players including the captain and the vice-captain returned positive results in the Rapid Antigen Tests for Covid-19. The management was barely able to field the playing xi. 

But after all that jitters faded and once the match began the Indian team showed how it is leaps and bounds ahead of its Irish opponents. With the help of Harnoor Singh’s 88, Angkrish Raghuvanshi’s 79 at the top and Rajvardhan Hangargekar’s quickfire 39*, the boys in blue were able to reach 307-5. 

Then, while bowling, there was no room given whatsoever for Ireland players to free their arms and the whole team was bowled out for 133 in the 39th over. 

Teague Wyllie guides Aussies home

In another match, the Scottish batters did give a better account of themselves as opposed to their showing against West Indies in the previous game. In this game, they reached 236-8 in 50 overs, giving a respectable target of 237 for Australia to chase. Tomas Mackintosh and Charlie Tear hit respective fifties for the Scotts while William Salzmann and Aidan Cahill picked two wickets each for Australia. 

The Australian batters knew that they had to chase down the target in as little time as possible to get their net run rate up. Keeping that in mind, the top three Aussie batters showed class with Wyllie going on to register his maiden century in the tournament. He made unbeaten 101 to chase down the target in only the 40th over. 

This took Australia’s net run rate ahead but not ahead of Sri Lanka, so in case there is a close encounter between West Indies and the islanders, and the hosts managed to win it, the Aussies might still not qualify for the quarterfinals. So Australia will be hoping that whoever wins that game wins it by a big margin.