The ACC Women’s T20 Championship - a qualifier for the next Asia Cup - continued in Malaysia today.

In Group A action this morning in Bangi, the hosts took on UAE, one of the pre-tournament favourites. Malaysian captain Winifred Duraisingam won the toss and put her opponents into bat. Esha Oza and Theertha Satish put on 72 for the opening wicket before Oza was out for 26.

Satish and Kavisha Egodage then put on another 62 without loss to take the UAE total to 134-1. Satish finished unbeaten on 52 whilst Egodage contributed 45. Matching scores of 34 from Mas Elysa and Elsa Hunter were the only double digit scores in the host’s reply as they were kept to 103-8 losing by 31 runs. Indhuja Nandakumar was the pick of the UAE bowlers, taking 4-10.

In the afternoon Group A game at the Kinrara Oval, Oman were put into bat by Singapore and scored 109-6 from their 20 overs. Priyanka Mendonca top scored with an unbeaten 48 with Bhakti Shetty’s 26 the only other double digit score.

Malaysia lost Zay Hua Tan for a duck in their first over, with the other opener Jocelyn Pooranakaran also falling for a duck but not until the fourth over with Shafina Mahesh dominating their 22 run partnership. A 68 run partnership between GK Diviya and Vinu Kumar was the key for Singapore. Kumar top scored with 38 whilst Diviya scored an unbeaten 25 as they completed a five wicket win with one ball to spare.

To call the sole Group B match today a low-scoring affair would be putting it mildly. Rain at the Kinrara Oval reduced the contest between Nepal and Bahrain to a seven over contest and when Bahrain were put in they could only manage 14 runs for the loss of six wickets. Nepal chased down the minuscule target in 3.4 overs to win by 8 wickets.

Three more matches are scheduled for tomorrow. Only one contest will take place in Group A with Qatar taking on Singapore in the morning. In Group B, Bhutan play Kuwait in the morning whilst Hong Kong will come up against Nepal in the afternoon.