Finch, White help Renegades gun down 181

A powerful union between Aaron Finch and Cameron White was augmented by some late fireworks from Dwayne Bravo to push the Melbourne Renegades to a valuable away victory over the Brisbane Heat at the Gabba.

Bravo's bat went flying as he lost grip of the blade in the penultimate over, but the Renegades never looked likely to do the same with the match, achieving both the first win for a team on the road and the first successful chase of BBL-05, after the Thunder and the Strikers each prospered defending a score.

For that the Renegades had to be grateful to Chris Tremain, Nathan Rimmington, Xavier Doherty and Bravo, who all bowled exemplary spells on a Brisbane surface offering typical bounce and pace to keep batsmen and bowlers alike in the contest. Tremain's early swing contributed to a cautious start by the Heat, who tallied only 33 from the Powerplay.

Even so, some strong late hitting by James Hopes and Ben Cutting meant the visitors still required 181 to win, the sort of task seldom achieved without a major partnership. It was to arrive via the bats of Finch and White after Chris Gayle's brief, and exciting, appearance at the top of the order with his gold bat.

Finch was in fluent touch, piercing the field frequently. White took more time to get going after a scratchy start, but found his range as the innings went on, and passed fifty with a towering six down the ground.

Their departures granted the Heat a narrow window, but Bravo's combination of a free bat swing and deft placement backward of square left Hopes with only five to defend from the final over, too few even for a bowler of his precision.

The Heat had begun shakily, as Jimmy Person struggled to lay a bat on the well-directed outswingers of Tremain, who was rightly rewarded with the opener's wicket and bowled tidily throughout.

Doherty, discarded from the national team earlier this year, followed up with a similarly parsimonious spell, and accounted for Lendl Simmons just as the West Indian was starting to look dangerous.

Joe Burns, walking out to bat under an arguably unfair level of pressure due to Usman Khawaja's impending return to the Test team for Boxing Day, was also to fall to Doherty's wiles, trying to power the left-arm spinner over the rope - as he had done to reach three figures in the Gabba Test - but taken at long-off.

From that uncertain beginning a mediocre score seemed likely, but Chris Lynn and Nathan Reardon were able to steady proceedings though neither quite gave full bent to their hitting power. Reardon was annoyed to sky a catch behind square leg after Lynn had arrowed a Bravo full toss to deep square leg.

However the Lynn-Reardon stand had set something of a platform, allowing Hopes and Cutting to tee off successfully in the closing overs. Together they added 51 from the last 22 balls of the innings, setting a steep target the Renegades would prove more than equal to.