Northeast and Jones set up Kent win
Kent maintained their hopes of reaching the knock-out stages of the Friends Life t20 by securing a deserved five-wicket win over Glamorgan in Canterbury
03-Jul-2011
Kent maintained their hopes of reaching the knock-out stages of the Friends Life t20 by securing a deserved five-wicket win over Glamorgan in Canterbury. Chasing 139 for their sixth win in 12 starts, the Spitfires eased home with four balls to spare courtesy of a sixth-wicket stand worth 57 between Man of the Match Sam Northeast and Geraint Jones, who finished unbeaten with 39 and 30 respectively.
Alviro Petersen had top-scored for Glamorgan with 33 in the visitors 138 for 6 but despite Robert Croft's three wickets, that total did not prove sufficient as Kent reached 142 for 5.
Kent's response got off to an unfortunate start when Joe Denly lost his footing and trod on leg stump, dislodging one bail to go hit wicket to Simon Jones for 8. Then, with his score on 18, fellow opener Rob Key aimed to reverse sweep against the spin of Croft only to bottom edge onto pad and boot, from where the ball bounced up allowing Mark Wallace to claim a sharp catch stood up to the stumps.
Darren Stevens was beaten in the flight by Croft to make it 66 for 3 and Kent's top t20 scorer with almost 300 runs, Azhar Mahmood, reached 32 before falling leg before when aiming an audacious paddle against Jim Allenby. In the next over Alex Blake heaved across the line to go leg before without scoring to give Croft excellent final figures of 3 for 27 from his four overs.
With the 100 up after 16 overs Geraint Jones pulled the biggest six of the day over midwicket against James Harris then, with 28 needed from the final three overs, plundered another six and two fours as 19 came off the next over from Allenby to bring victory within easy reach.
Having elected to bat first the Dragons were given a rousing start through their robust opener Mark Cosgrove. The burly left-hander off-drove for six against Mahmood in a cameo knock of 19 from 16 balls that ended with a missed a slog sweep against a Mahmood slower ball that pegged back Cosgrove's leg stump.
Petersen appeared to be getting into full stride when pulling consecutive fours off teenage left-arm seamer Adam Ball, but Ball had his revenge by clinging on to a low return catch that sent Petersen packing for 33 from 23 balls. Allenby added 14 before he edged to the keeper when aiming a run down to third man against offspinner James Tredwell then Chris Cook toe-ended an attempted pull against Wahab Riaz and spooned a catch to Tredwell at midwicket.
Gareth Rees (6) called for a risky second run to Stevens patrolling the deep midwicket boundary and lost the race against his throw to the striker's end and two balls later Graham Wagg (24), batting with a runner after injuring his foot, holed out to long-on. Riaz conceded 19, including five wides and a no ball, in his final over and the penultimate one of the innings as the Welsh county set the Spitfires an asking rate of 6.95 for victory.