Trent Rockets 127 for 1 (Malan 62*, Short 51*) beat Southern Brave 126 for 8 (de Lange 5-20) by nine wickets
de Lange, a late replacement as overseas player in the Rockets squad, claimed the tournament’s first five-for as reward for a spell of sustained and smart pace bowling to help the Rockets complete a nine-wicket victory with 18-balls to spare.
Provided excellent support from his side’s spin bowlers – not least Joe Root and Samit Patel, who both conceded less than a run-a-ball – de Lange’s burst kept Brave to the lowest total so far recorded in the competition.
But with little pressure from the run-rate, Malan was able to take a measured approach to his innings. And in partnership with D’Arcy Short he added an unbroken 124 from 82 balls to take Rockets to victory over one of the pre-tournament favourites for the title.
Marchant of menace
If you don’t know what de Lange looks like, imagine a bear in man fancy dress. Maybe the teeth are a little less sharp; maybe the back a little less hairy. But he is, basically, an enormous, beast of a man who looks as if he could snap tree trunks, hurl boulders and scare the villagers into chasing him with pitchforks. Really, he could make Arnold Schwarzenegger look like a vole, want to wear long sleeves and commit to going to the gym far more often.
Anyway, until a couple of weeks ago, de Lange was looking at spending this portion of the season playing for Somerset in the Royal London One-Day Cup. But with Wahab Riaz struggling to gain a visa, de Lange won a late call-up and has now made history – of sorts – by becoming the first person to take a five-for in the Hundred.
And quite an impression he made, too. Complementing his sharp pace – he reached 94mph/151kph at one stage – with good control and an ability to implement the plans set ahead of the game, he claimed three important wickets in his first 10 balls to ensure the Brave innings could never really gain any momentum.
After striking with his first ball – Delray Rawlins carving to cover – he went round the wicket to Colin de Grandhomme and, after a couple of short balls, bowled him round his legs with a full one as he moved across his stumps and looked to flick behind square. Devon Conway was then caught behind as he fished at one angled across him.
Generally, even the quickest bowlers need variations in limited-overs cricket. But the pace of the deliveries which took those wickets – 92.4mph, 92mph and 93mph respectively – tells a pretty accurate story of his spell: it was brutally, relentlessly, wonderfully fast. Those 10 balls cost just eight runs.
He came back later for more. After having Chris Jordan, who has sometimes struggled against the short ball, taken on the deep backward square fence with a well-directed 89mph bouncer, he then completed the format’s first five-for with a full, straight and fast one (91 mph) which bowled Garton. There was perhaps one slower ball in the entire 20.
Is Joe Root an allrounder these days? Probably. He opened the bowling in the last World T20 final, after all, and claimed two wickets, including that of Chris Gayle, in his first over. He’s recently taken a Test five-for (for just eight runs), too, and operated as England’s lone spinner in their most recent Tests.
Certainly he made a valuable contribution to Trent Rockets’ victory with his bowling here. Darting the ball in at a sharp pace – around 58mph at times – he sometimes cramped the batters for room and sometimes asked them to stretch for the ball. What he didn’t allow was skipping down the pitch and hitting over long-off. Eighteen of his 20 deliveries were at Brave’s plethora of top-order left-handers, and in all he conceded just 17 runs. Three of those were from wides and the only boundary came from a misfield.
Proving that he wasn’t reliant upon left-handers, though, Root claimed a wicket with 50% of the deliveries he bowled at right-handers. Sure, that was only two balls. But in bowling Liam Dawson with his final ball, Root completed an excellent contribution.
Crowd noise
You’re never more than about an hour from the latest missive – be it from the ECB or the broadcasters – informing you of record viewing figures at these games. Sometimes those figures are genuinely impressive; sometimes they are somewhat puzzling. The claim that Friday’s match at Edgbaston set a record for the highest attendance for a women’s domestic match outside London turned out to be inaccurate. It might, to be fair, have been the highest attendance at a professional women’s match outside London.
But the attendance at the men’s matches has been less impressive. The Kia Oval was not full on Thursday, for example. And it very often is for T20 games. And while Edgbaston’s numbers on Friday were decent – at 12,137 they were below what they might be for a local derby but above what they might be for most other domestic games – the figure for this game of 12,783 was again only respectable. This is a ground on which T20 has tended to sell well for several years.
Is that good enough? Maybe. But, judging by the chants and songs – at one stage, the crowd attempted to get their own “Sweet Caroline” going – the much fabled new audience isn’t quite as prevalent as you might have been told. And, contrary to what you might hear elsewhere, some kids have been seen previously at T20 Blast matches.
These games are attracting at least respectable attendances. And they’re entertaining encounters. But they’re not quite the miracle cure some would have you believe.
George Dobell is a senior correspondent at ESPNcricinfo
Source: ESPN Crickinfo