Both Janakpur Bolts and Lumbini Lions were desperate for a win in the 25th league-stage match of the 2nd Nepal Premier League on Friday.

However, while the Lions had only their fans backing them up, the Bolts had extra support, from the fans of Pokhara Avengers and Chitwan Rhinos. It was because the Bolts’ win over the Lions would have kept alive not only Janakpur’s chance for the playoffs, but also of Chitwan and Pokhara.

Nonetheless, the majority was saddened when the match ended with the Lions celebrating a hard-earned victory though chasing a low total. With a four-wicket win, the Lions, with eight points from four wins in seven matches, became the fourth and final team to book their berth in the playoffs.

The match also marked a scenario where the last season’s bottom-placed team, the Lions, knocked out the title winners, the Bolts.

After four consecutive losses, the Bolts registered their first win in their fifth match against Chitwan Rhinos on Thursday. And they suffered their fifth loss in six matches on Friday.

Electing to bat first, the Bolts, with the Namibian Jan Nicol Loftie-Eaton as the new captain after Wayne Parnell replaced Anil Kumar Sah, were expecting to post a good total on the board, defend it, and keep their hopes for the playoffs alive. But Janakpur failed in their mission.

The Bolts lost their first wicket in the first over, and by the end of the powerplay, the defending champions were at 36/3. Maaz Sadaqat (6 off 5), Sah (7 off 10) and Aasif Sheikh (20 off 17) were the wickets that the Bolts had lost by then.

It was in-at-four Sangeeth Cooray who kept the Bolts’s scorecard ticking while the other batters—Shubh Kansakar (11 off 15), Sanjay Krishnamurthi (14 off 11) and Loftie-Eaton (golden duck)—kept falling victim to the Lions. It was Nandan Yadav (27 off 23) who built a 49-run partnership for the sixth-wicket with Cooray (45 off 38) to take the team to 132/6 by the end of the first innings.

Sher Malla and Rohit Kumar Paudel bagged two wickets each for the Lions, while Ruben Trumpelmann and JJ Smit picked one each.

“I had belief in my players, and they proved it,” Paudel said after the win and qualifying for the playoffs after a bad first season. “As we did not have a good inaugural season, we had to prove something this season. We now have bigger challenges ahead, but we are ready to face them.”

The Bolts did not give up despite having to defend a low total. And thanks to the fight from Janakpur, the Lions, who required 133 runs from 120 deliveries, did not have an easy win.

Janakpur, with Lumbini’s opener Sumit Maharjan getting clean bowled by Cooray in the first ball of the second innings, had the Lions on the crease until the last over. Skipper Paudel and D’Arcy Short built a 61-run partnership for the second wicket.

Mayan Yadav brought the Bolts back to the game when he took back-to-back wickets of Paudel (34 off 32) and Sundeep Jora (0 off 1) in the last two balls of the 12th over. But the Lions bounced back from 84/4 with Niroshan Dickwella (17 off 20) and Smit (21 off 19) taking the score to 121/6 in 17.5 overs.

With 13 runs from extras, Dilip Nath (15 off 13) and Trumpelmann (6 off 5) finished the chase for the Lions with four wickets and five balls remaining. Cooray bagged three wickets in total for the Bolts, while Yadav had only one over to bowl, where he picked the two crucial wickets and gave away only three runs. Krishnamurthi bagged one, but all were insufficient for the win.

“Mayan’s spell gave us the hope that we could win it from there,” Loftie-Eaton said after the loss. “But it did not go our way.”

Janakpur are out of the race, but Loftie-Eaton said that the team will still be aiming for a win in their last match of the league stage to end the campaign on a high. The Bolts face Karnali Yaks in the last and 28th match of the league stage on Sunday.

Saturday will see two matches. The first, between Sudurpaschim Royals and Biratnagar Kings, will decide how the top four teams will figure in the table. The second match will see Pokhara Avengers face Chitwan Rhinos.