Rockets beat leaders Invincibles in thriller
Oval Invincibles miss out on the chance to confirm a place in the final of the men’s Hundred competition as they lose by six wickets to Trent Rockets in a thrilling encounter at Trent Bridge.
Oval Invincibles missed out on the chance to confirm a place in the final of the men’s Hundred competition as they lost to Trent Rockets by six wickets in a thrilling encounter at Trent Bridge.
Opener Dawid Malan hit an unbeaten 53 as the Invincibles set a challenging target of 151, but Tom Alsop (41*) and Rovman Powell (45) put on an impressive display of strokeplay for the already eliminated Rockets as they won with six balls to spare.
Table-topping Invincibles had already qualified for the competition’s knockout phase, but will now have to wait for the result of Thursday’s final group game to see if they will progress directly to the final at Lord’s on Sunday.
The visitors chose to bat against the already eliminated Rockets and started well, reaching 47-0 before Lewis Gregory removed Will Jacks lbw.
Malan shared a partnership of 71 with Ollie Cox (39), ended when the new England call-up was bowled by Sam Cook, and Donovan Ferreira clouted 27 from 10 deliveries to close the innings.
Rockets had leading run-scorer Tom Banton caught behind for six off the bowling of Saqib Mahmood early in their reply, and were behind the rate on 57-3 at the halfway stage.
But their innings began to build momentum, starting with Alsop hammering tournament leading wicket-taker Adam Zampa for consecutive sixes.
Needing 56 with 25 balls remaining, five boundaries in the next ten balls helped bring that total down to 24.
Powell smashed Sam Curran for his fourth six of the night, but the England seamer got his revenge from the following ball, having him caught in the deep by Ferreira to end the partnership of 80.
But by that stage the damage had been done, and Alsop struck Mahmood for four to see his side home.
What else do you need to know?
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Birmingham Phoenix now host Manchester Originals on Thursday knowing that a win will not only secure a place in the knockouts, but also potentially catapult them from fourth to top and straight into a place in Sunday’s final at Lord’s. However, given their current net run-rate is significantly lower than that of the Invincibles, they would need to win convincingly at Edgbaston to take first place and send the current leaders to the eliminator match against Southern Brave at The Oval on Saturday. The Rockets, meanwhile, do not move, finishing fifth.
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Prior to dismissing Banton for six, Saqib Mahmood saw the Rockets opener dropped in the slips by Jacks from the first ball of the innings, and then had his lbw dismissal overturned by the third umpire. He finally nabbed his man from the final delivery of his opening 10-ball set.
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Having dismissed Powell with the 90th ball of the innings, England seamer Sam Curran was taken out of the attack after the next delivery, having sent down a second above waist-height full toss. Alsop still hit the ball for four, and with two further extras on top, then a Mahmood wide when he came on as a replacement, the Rockets then only needed eight from the last ten balls. They knocked them off in four, with Curran left high and dry on 15 deliveries.
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The dismissal of Powell, did, however, move Curran level with Zampa at the top of the tournament’s leading wicket-taking charts. They now have 17 each.
‘It wasn’t our day’ – what they said
Rockets batter Alex Hales: “A really good win against a very strong side. We probably feel a bit frustrated about the way the tournament’s gone. We’ve lost a couple of really close games, it’s probably what could have been this year.
“We had two games where we needed ten off ten balls. A frustraing year for us, and had we been more clinical at times we’d have probably been playing finals.
“We thought it’d be a low-scoring game but it actually played really well, particularly in our innings, it kissed onto the bat beautifully.”
Invincibles batter Ollie Cox: “To not get the win is not ideal, but it looks like we’ll finish top whatever happens tomorrow. It’s always nice to finish on a win so we’ll definitely reflect on what we did wrong today, but I think the boys tried hard and it wasn’t our day.
“We’ve only lost two games this season so we’ve been doing some pretty good stuff. I think we’ll park this one aside and say sometimes you play average cricket.”
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What is happening on Thursday?
The final two matches of the group stage take place as Birmingham Phoenix face Manchester Originals (women’s at 15:00 BST, men’s at 18:30).
You can follow ball-by-ball commentary of both matches on BBC Radio 5 Sports Extra, BBC Sounds and the BBC Sport website and app.
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