Nepal vs UAE: The 2023 Final That This Weekend's Rematch Has to Live Up To
Nepal beat the UAE in the 2023 ACC Premier Cup final to reach that year's Asia Cup. Three years later, the same two teams meet in the same final for the same prize.
· CricLiveOnline staff
Some finals are a first meeting between two sides who’ve never shared a stage this big. Saturday’s isn’t one of those. Nepal and the UAE have played this exact fixture before — an ACC Premier Cup final, an Asia Cup place on the line — and Nepal won it.
Kirtipur, May 2023
The last time these two teams met in a Premier Cup final, it was in Nepal’s own back yard: Tribhuvan University International Cricket Ground, Kirtipur, on home soil. The UAE batted first and were bowled out for 117 in 33.1 overs — Lalit Rajbanshi taking 4/14 to lead the collapse, with Asif Khan’s 46 the only real resistance.
Nepal’s chase was built around one innings: Gulsan Jha’s 67 off 84 balls, an innings that mixed patience with three fours and six sixes, supported by Bhim Sharki’s 36. Nepal reached the target of 118 in 30.3 overs with seven wickets in hand.
NEPAL 118/3 (30.3 ov)
Nepal won by 7 wickets · Final · May 1–2, 2023, Kirtipur
The win sent Nepal to the 2023 Asia Cup, where they shared a group with India and Pakistan — exactly the kind of fixture list an Associate nation almost never gets any other way.
What’s the same, what’s different
Lalit Rajbanshi, the destroyer of that 2023 final, is still part of this squad and picked up two more wickets in this year’s semi-final rout of Oman. Gulsan Jha, the match-winner with the bat in 2023, was Player of the Match again this tournament — an unbeaten 44 to see off Saudi Arabia in the group stage. There’s real continuity in this squad between the team that won it once and the one trying to win it again.
What’s different is the venue and the shape of the opposition. This final is in Kuala Lumpur, not Kathmandu — no home advantage this time — and the UAE arrive having reached the final by demolishing Hong Kong’s chase in just 11 overs, a very different route to the one that saw them bowled out for 117 three years ago. Their form and Hong Kong’s tournament are covered here.
Does history actually help?
Not directly — different squads, different conditions, three years of cricket in between for both sides. But it does answer one question before a ball is bowled on Saturday: Nepal have already shown they can win this exact match, for this exact prize, against this exact opponent. That’s not nothing walking into a final.
Full preview of Saturday’s game, and what’s riding on it for both sides, is here.
NepalUAEACC Premier CupAsia CupGulsan Jha