Bangladesh through to Asia Youth Cup semis

Bangladesh reached the semi-finals of the Asia Youth Cup Under-19 Cricket tournament with a comfortable 6-wicket victory over Malaysia in the rain- interrupted second group match at the Kallang ground in Singapore Tuesday.

Earlier, in the first group match, Bangladesh crushed Hong Kong by 8 wickets on Monday at the same venue.

Winning the toss in the day's match, Bangladesh captain Fahim Muntasir Sumit sent Malaysia to bat first and restricted them to 116 for all in 47.2 overs.

Spinner Imran Rahim Lalu and pacer Bikash Ranjan Das shared seven wickets to destroy the Malaysian batting.

Lalu claimed four wickets conceding 14 runs in 9 overs with five maidens and Bikash took three for 13 in 8.2 overs with two maidens.

Skipper Sumit bagged two wickets for 30 runs in 10 overs while pacer Tariqul Hasan Tushar took one wicket for 24 runs in 8 overs.

Malaysian middle-order Vickneswaran was the top scorer for his side making 31 runs off 47 balls. One down Rohan Suppiah made 22 off 55 deliveries and Lee contributed 16 runs off 34 balls.

Malaysian innings over, the match was interrupted by heavy shower and the winning target was fixed at 80 runs in 26 overs. Bangladesh reached the target making 83 runs for four wickets in 21.2 overs.

The two openers, Imran Ahmed and Nahidul Haq Shaon, contributed 48 runs to make the Bangladesh's task easy.

Imran scored 21 runs off 46 balls while Shaon made 22 facing 41 deliveries, before bowled by Vishnu Suppiah.

Vishnu took another wicket, that of Bangladesh skipper Sumit, who returned to the pavilion with duck. One down Hannan Sarker made an unbeaten 14 runs off 24 balls.

Vishnu captured his three wickets giving away only 6 runs in 5 overs with two maidens while Norajmy took the remaining wicket of Mazharul Haq Mridul (9) for 24 runs in 4.2 overs.

Other matches of day were abandoned due to rain.

Nepal and Papua New Guinea almost confirmed their semi-final berth from group B with three points each.

* With one match to be played by each team in the first round, the points are as follows:

Group A- Bangladesh 4, Malaysia 2, Hong Kong 1, UAE 1. Group B- Nepal 3, Papua New Guinea 3, Singapore 1, Thailand 1.