Namibia and Afghanistan notched their third straight victories in the Twenty20 World Cup qualifier Thursday. Namibia survived a late charge from the United States to record a 17-run win, while Afghanistan made short work of Denmark with an 89-run victory. Opening batsman Raymond van Schoor hit an unbeaten 79 as Namibia posted a challenging 177-4. The US made a match of it through Aditya Mishra's 53 before finishing on 160-7 in Dubai. Italy, Oman, Uganda and Kenya are the other opponents of Namibia before the top three from each of the two eight-team groups will go through to another qualifying stage for the World Twenty20 in Sri Lanka, which begins Sept. 18. The US was in the hunt until Christi Viljoen clean bowled Mishra in the 15th over with the total on 117. Mishra hit two fours and five sixes and looked threatening with a 40-run fourth wicket stand with Orlando Baker. Ireland was taken to the limit by Italy before winning by two wickets at Abu Dhabi. Ireland, which restricted Italy to 100-7, overhauled the target with two balls and two wickets to spare. All-rounder Karim Sadiq smashed 91 off 60 balls in Afghanistan's healthy total of 172-5 before going on to take 4-12 with the ball as Denmark finished on 83-9. Hong Kong could not repeat its Wednesday's performance when it beat Bermuda. After Canada restricted Hong Kong to 81-8, Hiral Patel (40) and Nitesh Kumar (22 not out) steered their team to 84-2 in just 14 overs. In other Group A matches, Canada beat Hong Kong by eight wickets and the Netherlands won by four runs over Bermuda. Michael Swart's knock of 53 enabled the Dutch to score 125-9 and Timm van der Gugten chipped in with 4-22 to restrict Bermuda to 121-8. Kenya won its first match after being beaten in its two previous Group B matches, defeating Oman by 35 runs. Alex Obanda (52) and Duncan Allan (51) powered Kenya to 176-5 and Oman never looked a chance in its run chase to finish on 141-9. Papua New Guinea also registered its first win in three matches with a 35-run victory over Nepal. PNG totalled 137-8 and restricted Nepal to 102-8.
