Savitra Bhandari, who became the captain of the Nepali team, succeeded in scoring a hat-trick after winning 9-0 against Laos.
The Nepali Women's National Football Team made their hundredth game memorable in many ways on Sunday. It was a 9-0 win over Laos. It was also the first match for Nepal under the leadership of head coach Patrick de Wilde. Along with this, Nepal has made a winning start in Group 'F' of the Asia Cup qualifiers.
"This is a very big victory for us," said Renuka Nagarkote, the main player of the team, "This result will be an inspiration for future games. Since the arrival of the new coach, we have played in a new style and it has been successful. But she remains the most influential player for coach De Wilde.
De Wilde told Kantipur, 'Renuka's game was amazing.' Nepal took the lead in the 12th minute of the game, when Anita Basnet opened the scoring. Since then, Laos continued its struggle while Nepal did not forget to create pressure. That's the kind of game coach De Wilde likes. Renuka also added, 'We played aggressive football with fun against Laos.' They did not forget to congratulate head coach De Wilde. Those fans also liked his style of playing football. Savitra Bhandari scored the second goal for the team just one minute before the end of the first half. She was the captain of the team.
It rained goals in the second half as well. Saru Limbu, who is playing her 50th game for Nepal, scored in the second minute of the second half. Then Savitra scored the third goal for the team in the 55th minute. She completed her personal hat-trick in the 74th minute. Meanwhile, Rashmikumari Ghising also scored a goal in the 55th minute.
Savitra didn't stop even then. She scored her fourth goal in the 79th minute. Substitute Anita Casey scored the team's eighth goal in the 83rd minute. Savitra scored the ninth goal with one minute left of the game. He probably won't even get credit for it, because it could have been an own goal.
Nepal will now face Sri Lanka on Wednesday and Uzbekistan in their final match on Saturday. After the victory against Laos, coach de Wilde said, "Now our attention will be focused on the game against Sri Lanka." Then we will think about the match against Uzbekistan.'
