The Stan Nagaiah Trophy, named in honour of a former Singapore player, was played for the first time since 2018 this week with Malaysia emerging victorious. The series began in 1995 as a limited overs counterpart to the three-day Saudara Cup match and was initially played as 50-over contests before T20 was introduced for the first time in 2016.

Singapore hosted Malaysia for the three match T20I series - the first time the series had that status - with all matches played at the Indian Association Ground.

Malaysia were put into bat for the first game on Tuesday and lost Virandeep Singh from the first ball of their innings. Scoring was slow and steady until Sharvin Muniandy entered at the fall of the fifth wicket and hit 40 from 36 balls. He was run out from the penultimate delivery of the innings, with his team scoring 137-7.

Singapore’s reply progressed in similar fashion - they lost a wicket in the first over and scoring was slow until their number seven Aryaman Sunil scored an unbeaten 36 from 20 balls to help secure a four wicket win with a ball to spare.

In the second game yesterday Malaysia chose to bat first, against losing a wicket to a duck in the first over. A 78 run partnership between Ahmad Faiz and Syed Aziz was key for Singapore, Aziz top scoring in the innings with 56 from 39 balls. Muhammad Syahadat hit 40 from 24 balls as the visitors made 177-5 from their 20 overs.

Janak Prakash top scored in Singapore’s reply with 56 from 31 balls and shared in a 54 run fourth wicket partnership with Manpreet Singh and a 45 run partnership with Navin Parma for the fifth wicket. Singapore scored 154-7 from their 20 overs, losing by 23 runs.

The final match today was reduced to a 13 over affair rain delayed the start with the home team choosing to bat first after they won the toss. Surendran Chandramohan top scored with 45 from 26 balls as they scored 122-7 from their 13 overs, Anwar Rahman taking 3-15.

Malaysia chased down their target with just five balls to spare, Sharvin Muniandy top scoring with an unbeaten 26 from only nine balls in the five wicket win.

The series served as preparation for the upcoming global T20 qualifier B tournament in Zimbabwe for the Singaporeans. Malaysia will be hosting a quadrangular series starting on Saturday that will also involve Bhutan, Maldives and Thailand.