Hong Kong beat the United Arab Emirates by two wickets to seal the final spot in the Asia Cup 2018. The match was cut short to 24 overs per side due to heavy rain. The match was first interrupted when the scorecard read 65/3 after 15.2 Overs. Once the game restarted Ashfaq Ahmed who was unbeaten at that stage with a 40 ball 43, turned it on with sixes and fours raining in Kuala Lumpur.
from the remaining 8.4 overs, UAE finished on high with Ashfaq scoring 79 from 51 balls and the team scoring 176/9 from 24 overs. For Hong Kong Aizaz Khan picked up a fifer while Nadeem Ahmed chipped in with 3 wickets.
Hong Kong found enough contributions from their batting order helped them get their revised target of 179 runs with 3 balls left. Hong Kong started the chase with a bang and the openers went on to add 64 runs in the six overs. Soon UAE bowlers struck back and from 64/0 Hong Kong was struggling at 68/3 in the space of 10 balls.
Efforts from Christopher Carter(33_ and Ehsan Khan(29), the duo put on 53 run partnership for the fifth wicket, took Hong Kong closer to the target before the game took a dramatic turn with Carter being run out. Overs later Mohammed Naveed struck twice in the single over with Hong Kong struggling at 147/7.
Scott McKechnie and Tanwir Afzal fought back for Hong Kong with a valuable adding 29 valuable runs for the 8th wicket. Tanwir(15) fell off the last ball of the penultimate over but Hongkong were 3 runs away from the Asia cup spot and Scott McKechnie made sure that the team went over the line with 2 wickets remaining.
