Aamir Kaleem batted stormily against Sri Lanka AImage Credit source: Getty Images
Before the start of T20 World Cup 2026, every team is busy preparing itself completely so that it can perform strongly on the field during the tournament. For this very reason, practice matches are being played before the tournament and the result of one such match surprised everyone. The Oman cricket team participating in the tournament has registered a shocking victory in its first practice match. In this match, Oman defeated Sri Lanka A team by 5 wickets on the strength of a 44 year old batsman.
Sri Lanka A is in bad shape
Sri Lanka, which is hosting this T20 World Cup along with India, also adopted the same method as Team India for the first practice match. India had fielded India A in the first practice match against USA, while the World Cup squad was rested. Similarly, Sri Lanka also fielded its ‘A’ team in the practice match in place of the players selected for the tournament. But while India A won its match, Sri Lanka A suffered a shocking defeat.
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Although there were only two players in the Sri Lanka A team who had some experience in international cricket, but most of the players had played a lot of domestic cricket there and in Sri Lanka A, so they were expected to play well against a team with less facilities like Oman. But this did not happen and it started with batting itself. In this match played in Colombo, Sri Lanka A batted first and the entire team could score only 145 runs after losing 9 wickets. Vanujaa Sahan scored the maximum 29 runs for him. Shah Faisal and Jay Odedra took 2-2 wickets for Oman.
Miracle of 44 year old Kaleem
Even in front of a fast bowler like Dilshan Madhushanka, Oman stunned everyone by achieving this target in just 18 overs by losing 5 wickets. Only two batsmen contributed to Oman’s victory – Aamir Kaleem and Vinayak Shukla. Other 5 batsmen could reach only single digit score. But 44 year old opener Aamir Kaleem proved to be a star in both of these. Aamir, who scored a half-century against India in last year’s Asia Cup, batted brilliantly and played an explosive inning of 80 runs in just 47 balls, which included 8 fours and 3 sixes. He took the team beyond 110 runs in just 14 overs. Whereas Vinayak Shukla scored unbeaten 39 runs in 24 balls.