Allen, Fraser-McGurk, Bartlett, Rauf give Unicorns second straight win

Finn Allen smashed his second straight 50-plus score, Jake Fraser-McGurk roared back to form, and fast bowlers Xavier Bartlett and Haris Rauf picked up four wickets apiece to lead San Francisco Unicorns to their second win on the bounce in MLC 2025. Unicorns posted a 200-plus total for the second game in a row, after their record-breaking 269 for 5 in the opening game of the tournament, and it proved to be too much for Los Angeles Knight Riders as only two of their batters scored over 30.

It was Fraser-McGurk this time who led Unicorns' charge with a blistering 88 off 38 balls that was studded with 11 sixes and just two fours, and it came after he had tallied just 61 runs in his last seven T20 innings at an average of just 8.71, which also included him getting dropped from the Delhi Capitals (DC) playing XI in the IPL. Against LAKR, however, he and Allen hammered 121 runs in just 55 balls for the second wicket - including a powerplay of 76 for 1. The highlight in that phase was the four consecutive sixes Fraser-McGurk smashed off Shadley van Schalkwyk in the fifth over that went for 25. After a rare boundary-less seventh over for just four runs from Sunil Narine, and seven more in the next bowled by Jason Sangha, Fraser-McGurk and Allen got back to smashing the ball around before Allen holed out to long-on off Narine for 52 off 27.

Fraser-McGurk replied with three more sixes in the 13th over after he had brought up his 21-ball fifty, before he too handed a catch, to mid-off against van Schalkwyk. The top order had set the stage as Unicorns were going at over 12 an over when Fraser-McGurk fell with the score on 167 with 39 balls to go. The LAKR bowlers pulled things back after that as Unicorms lost four wickets and managed just 52 runs thereafter. They lost Hassan Khan, Corey Anderson, Bartlett and Brody Couch in the space of three overs, which included a double-wicket over from Ali Khan. Rauf struck a six and a four in the last two overs to stretch them past 200 and post a challenging total.

The LAKR chase was dented twice early on with the wickets of openers Andre Fletcher and Alex Hales in the first 21 balls. No. 3 Unmukt Chand kept them going with a 30-ball half-century to post 66 in the powerplay. He lost his partner Nitish Kumar in the eighth over to Hassan that ended a quick stand of 46 off 24. Chand and Matthew Tromp then managed just 33 runs off the next 30 balls that saw three boundary-less overs on the bounce. Chand took off again with a four and a six in the next two overs before Rauf roared with a seven-run double-wicket over that saw Chand and the powerful Andre Russell walk back, the second dismissal coming through a 146km thunderbolt that rattled the stumps. LAKR were five down and needed 107 from 42 balls, which proved to be too stiff. Saif Badar scored 17 off eight balls and Narine, the captain, smoked 27 off 13 before Rauf struck with another double-wicket over that virtually ended the chase in the 19th over.