Abhinav Khanal took a hat-trick to set up a comprehensive seven-wicket victory for Meghalaya against Arunachal Pradesh in the 1st North East Little Masters Trophy 2025, a tournament for U-14 boys, in Guwahati today.
Batting first, Arunachal were dismissed in just over an hour for 41 in 14.1 overs out of the allotted 33. Meghalaya then chased this down in 11.4 overs for the loss of three wickets.
A sensational performance by Abhinav rocked the Arunachal batting line-up with the Meghalaya bowler claiming near-impossible figures of 7/3 in 3.1 overs, which included a hat-trick.
Abhinav bowled Nabam Jamper off the first ball of the 11th over and then proceeded to dismiss the next two batters for golden ducks. He also bagged another scalp off the fifth delivery for four wickets in a single over. He was rightly declared Player of the Match at the end of proceedings.
Arunachal lost two early wickets to Calvin P Syngkli (2/9 in 3 overs) but went from 4/2 to 37 without further loss. However, that is when Abhinav wrecked the opposition, with five batters dismissed without the addition of a single run. Tamser Ngurang top-scored in difficult circumstances for Arunachal with 18 runs before he became Abhinav’s first victim of the day. The other wicket to fall was claimed by Donsrang Chubat Sangma (1/2 in 3 overs).
The chase was simple enough but Meghalaya still lost two batters in run outs and another caught behind. However, Iaisan Khongji (11) and Abdulla Pathaw (10) did enough to get Meghalaya close to the target and Abhinav (6 not out) and Janggo K Marak (1 not out) took the team across the line.
This was Meghalaya’s third and last group match. They had beaten Mizoram by 47 runs in their first outing on 20 April before losing to hosts Assam by nine wickets two days ago.
Meghalaya are thus second in Group A. The top two teams will progress to the semifinals.
