It was a shoot-out between two of the world’s best allrounders at Trent Bridge as Ellyse Perry and Nat Sciver-Brunt slugged it out with the bat for Midlands supremacy. The Birmingham Phoenix were looking for a badly needed win and achieved it by three runs, in a finish that went down to the final ball.
Phoenix won the toss and chose to bat, but it didn’t look like the best decision, as the Rockets bowlers initially kept things tight. Alexa Stonehouse, the left-arm pace bowler, started proceedings from the Radcliffe Road end and bowled ten straight through for just six runs.
The powerplay mustered 22 runs, with Sterre Kalis and Sophie Devine eager to get things moving. Alana King then entered the fray and again the batters allowed her to bowl her ten straight through with little fuss. Devine felt it was time to press the accelerator, but unfortunately for the Phoenix, she missed the final ball of King’s set and was lbw for 17 from 21 balls.
The Phoenix fortunes were about to take a turn as their captain, Perry stepped into the action and started to quietly make her mark on the game. Kalis responded at the other end and began to score more freely as well and, in the end, was stranded not out on 48 from 42 balls.
The pair shared a stand of 101 as the Phoenix put a defendable score of 139/3 on the board. Much of that was down to Perry, who has often been criticised for the rate at which she scores runs in the shorter formats. There was no doubting her obvious class today and she didn’t look troubled until the 96th ball of the innings, as looking to secure her side late innings runs, an attempted ramp picked out Alexa Stonehouse to give Heather Graham her only wicket of the game. Perry had cleared the boundary sponges four times and finished with six fours in her 34-ball 66.
Trent Rockets have a player in Sciver-Brunt who can deliver the same fireworks and often does it with skill and class. It appeared that she was going to bring her side home again today, her fifty coming up in 33 balls. She attacked Hannah Baker with three consecutive fours, and the Rockets suddenly put the boosters on. They had fallen behind as a result of some tight Phoenix bowling and Charis Pavely picked up two for 20 and Katie Levick two for 26.
Phoenix had looked like they were in control, but when you haven’t won since four Prime Ministers ago you sometimes forget what it takes and a late counter-attack from Graham smashing 30 from 12 balls gave the Rockets a chance of getting over the line.
Emily Arlott was charged with the final five balls of the game and Graham smashed the first ball for four before Alana King ran herself out going for the second run off the next ball. There was still time for some last-minute drama.
Graham launched the next ball for six, and the Rockets were still in it with Nat Wraith also being run out from the penultimate ball to give Graham the strike. She needed to clear the ropes to bring home an unlikely win with five still needed from the final ball, but it was not to be, and the Midlands is confirmed as orange.
