Outlaws make it four in a row
Source -
sportinglife.com
The Nottinghamshire Outlaws stayed top of the North Division in the Twenty20 Cup after beating Yorkshire Phoenix by seven wickets with five balls remaining at Headingley.
Chasing a 160 target, Notts never looked under any real pressure after Graeme Swann and their New Zealand captain Stephen Fleming had got their reply off to a rapid start.
And Fleming, who had a season with Yorkshire earlier in his career, went on to receive the man-of-the-match award for his cleanly struck 60 from 52 deliveries with five fours and a six.
Fleming and Samit Patel made the game secure for Notts with a 87-run stand for the second wicket before Fleming was caught on the boundary by Michael Lumb and Patel was run out for 43 by Craig White's direct hit at the non-striker's end in the penultimate over. It left David Hussey to crack the winning boundary off Jason Gillespie.
Yorkshire did well to reach 159 for six after they had slumped to 22 for three inside five overs, Lumb being caught on the boundary edge off Charlie Shreck, Darren Lehmann edging AJ Harris to the wicketkeeper before he had scored and captain White falling to a direct hit on the stumps by Hussey.
This left Andrew Gale and Anthony McGrath with a lot of repair work to do and Notts kept it so tight that Yorkshire were only 50 for three at the halfway stage.
But each batsman managed a boundary off Yorkshire exile Gareth Clough, and two leg-side sixes for Gale improved the situation still further.
The fourth wicket pair had added 60 in 10 overs when McGrath was bowled attempting to reverse sweep Patel for 32 from 27 balls with three fours.
Gale completed his first Twenty20 half-century but in the same over from Swann he too was bowled trying to reverse sweep, after receiving 40 balls and striking four fours and two sixes.
Chris Gilbert made sure there was an explosive end to the innings by thrashing 19 off the final over from Patel, his shots including two fours and a six, and he would have made it 20 runs if he had not run one short on the last delivery. His unbeaten 36 came off just 14 balls with four fours and a six.
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