With Arif Sheikh's half century, Nepal defeated the Netherlands by 5 wickets in World Cup Cricket League-2 on Wednesday. After Arif scored the only half-century of the game, Nepal stunned the Netherlands and won in Scotland. After Arif scored 78 runs, Nepal completed the target of 226 runs in 47.1 overs at Forth Hill in Dundee.

Arif completed his fifty in 81 balls by hitting a six over point off Vivian Kingma in the 40th over. In the 42nd over, Arif hit another six off Kingma . Arif played a total of 99 balls and hit 7 fours and 2 sixes and was dismissed by King.

Arif scored his eighth half-century while playing the 59th ODI. Also this is his high score . Earlier, 66 runs was his personal high score. Arif shared a solid partnership of 89 runs in 92 balls with Dipendra Singh Airi. Dipendra played 51 balls and hit 3 fours and scored 38 unbeaten runs. Gulshan Jha, who hit the winning six, scored 11 runs in 4 balls and remained not out. _{Arif Sheikh}

Arif had earlier shared an important partnership of 55 runs for the fourth wicket with captain Rohit Paudel. Rohit played 39 balls and hit 1 four and was run out for 23 runs. Arif's brother Asif Sheikh and Kushal Bhurtel had previously given Nepal a moderate start by adding 32 runs. In the seventh over, Paul van Meekeren bowled Asif and gave the Netherlands their first success. Asif played 22 balls and scored 19 runs by hitting 3 fours.

Kushal and Bhim Sarki added 31 runs for the second wicket. After both the batsmen got out with a gap of 5 runs, Nepal was in crisis. Batting all-rounder Michael Levitt, who had taken just 2 wickets in the previous 13 ODIs, dismissed both Kushal and Bhim. Bhim played 26 balls and hit 1 four and scored 11 runs. Kushal, bowled for the inside edge, scored 25 runs with 5 fours in 42 balls.

Netherlands, who won the toss and decided to bat first, were bowled out for 225 runs in 49.1 overs. Leading bowlers Karan KC, Sompal Kami, Sandeep Lamichhane and Lalit Rajvanshi bowled well and Nepal prevented League-2's top team Netherlands from making a big score. 

Sompal took 3 wickets while Karan, Sandeep and Lalit took 2 wickets each. In the second over of the match and in the first ball of his first over, Sompal dismissed Levitt for 1 run. After Sompal's opening pair Karan bowled Max O Dowd for 4 runs in the fifth over, Nepal was in control of the game from the start.

captain Scott Edwards scored 46 runs. He played 71 balls and hit 4 boundaries. Edwards shared a partnership of 72 runs in 101 balls with Bikramjit Singh for the third wicket. Singh played 56 balls and scored 38 runs by hitting 2 fours. He was dismissed by Sandeep in his first over.

Devrehate spinner Lalit also took a wicket in his first ball. In the 27th over, Lalit got Edwards caught by captain Rohit . Lalit also took the wicket of Jacques Lyon Cachet. Cachet played 34 balls and hit 1 four and scored 27 runs. Lalit, who played in place of Devrehate fast bowler Region Dhakal, spent 30 runs in 7 overs and took 2 wickets. Despite taking 2 wickets against Scotland, Reason gave away 78 runs in 10 overs.

Sandeep also took the wicket of Teja Nidamanuru . He took 2 wickets for 48 runs in his 10 over spell. Nidamanuru scored 13 runs off 29 balls. Noah Crows, who batted at number seven, scored the highest 48 runs. He was bowled by Sompal who hit 5 fours while playing 55 balls.