The Notts Outlaws thumped their highest total in t20 cricket at Trent Bridge as they beat Yorkshire Carnegie by 53 runs. Yorkshire, who would have needed to break their own record run tally to take the points ran out of steam as the required run-rate spiralled.

MATCH INFO

MATCH REPORT

The Notts Outlaws thumped their highest total in t20 cricket at Trent Bridge as they beat Yorkshire Carnegie by 53 runs. Yorkshire, who would have needed to break their own record run tally to take the points ran out of steam as the required run-rate spiralled.

Yorkshire had the better of the early overs as Riki Wessels popped Adil Rashid tamely to Ryan Sidebottom at short third-man and Alex Hales was brilliantly caught by Richard Pyrah at back ward point off a low Sidebottom full toss. It came quick and low to his left, but Pyrah rarely misses those chances.

David Hussey and Adam Voges then added 53 for the 3rd wicket before Hussey skied a drive off David Wainwright to Joe Root at long-on. They had taken 17 off Rashid’s second over and Voges smashed a low full toss for six off Pyrah as the innings accelerated.

Samit Patel joined Voges in what would become a match winning stand. Andrew Gale got a finger to a Voges pull through midwicket and the hundred was on the board after 11.3 overs. Voges hit 74 from 46 balls, including 10 fours and a six, but he played second fiddle to Patel whose 52 came in only 23 balls. He hit three sixes in four deliveries from Root as the pair shared 94 for the fourth wicket in just eight overs before both were dismissed by Anthony McGrath’s first over.

Voges dismissal was a near carbon copy of Hussey’s earlier as he hit high to Root at long-on who ran in and took the catch at waist height. Patel was caught by Steve Patterson and Notts were 174-5 after 16.5 overs. Chris Read hit a typically perky unbeaten 34 which included 1 four and 3 sixes, one of which was a pick up off Sidebottom which cleared the short New Stand boundary by a country mile.

Steven Mullaney was well caught by Wainwright at cover after he top edged a heave off McGrath, who finished with tidy figures of 2-0-17-3, despite being hit for a maximum by Read off his final ball.
Nottinghamshire had won the toss and decided to bat and reaching 215-6 in their 20-overs vindicated Hussey’s decision. Yorkshire needed to score at 10.80 runs per over and never managed to drag the rate down.

Gale (17) and Jonny Bairstow (31) looked to attack in the powerplay, but 6 fours and 1 six – a towering pull by Bairstow off Darren Pattinson - between them saw the required rate climb. Gale went down on one knee to scoop Ben Phillips to the fine leg boundary and flicked the next short delivery over the infield to third man. But he tried to repeat the initial flicked sweep and was bowled.

Adam Lyth does not need to improvise. His elegant drives started to find the gaps on a fast outfield. He got off the mark when he creamed a straight drive past Carter, but the introduction of Man of the Match Patel with the ball saw the Tykes slip further behind.

Patel’s first over yielded just 2 runs and in his second he had Bairstow caught at long-off by Mullaney. After 10 overs the scoreboard showed Yorkshire at 82-2 in comparison to the Outlaws 81-3, but Yorkshire needed someone to play the destructive Patel role and at the moment no one is capable of doing that in the Carnegie lower middle order.

Lyth continued to stroke boundaries as McGrath struggled to find the gaps, but each time the Whitby-born left-hander ended an over and looked at the scoreboard he could see the required rate had gone up. Any hope Yorkshire had of taking the game dissolved in the 13th over as Andy Carter had Lyth caught at long-on by Mullaney and McGrath (9) was lbw to the subsequent ball. Lyth’s 43 had taken 27 balls and included 6 fours and 1 six.

So 114-2 had become 114-4 and the new batsmen, Root and Gerard Brophy, could not keep up with an asking rate of 16.50. Root likes to scoop and reverse which look great when they come off, but he misses as many as he hits and is too good a batsman to have to rely completely on innovation.
Four more wickets fell in the closing stages, with Scott Elstone's stunning boundary catch at wide mid-wicket to dismiss Gerard Brophy off Patel worth the entrance fee alone.

Nottinghamshire made it two wins from two matches in the Northern Division and Yorkshire must wait until Thursday when they take on Worcestershire Royals at Headingley for another opportunity to get their t20 show on the road. Before the t20 began I thought Warwickshire would win the trophy and Nottinghamshire, Lancashire and Yorkshire would be the other Northern Quarter-Finalists. Nothing I’ve seen so far has changed my mind.

JAMES BUTTLER at TRENT BRIDGE

YORKSHIRE CARNEGIE SQUAD

Andrew GALE (c), Adam LYTH, Joe ROOT, Anthony McGRATH, Jonny BAIRSTOW, Gerard BROPHY, Gary BALLANCE, Adil RASHID, Ajmal SHAHZAD, Richard PYRAH, David WAINWRIGHT, Azeem RAFIQ, Ryan SIDEBOTTOM and Steve PATTERSON.

MATCH PREVIEW

If Yorkshire Carnegie are to reach the Quarter-Finals they will need to improve in all of the three cricket disciplines. Andrew Gale's brilliant 54 aside the batsman failed to capitalise on an excellent start on Friday and lost momentum. The bowlers were excellent at times but poor others and the fielding was haphazard and did not match that of the opposition.

There is a long way to go in the group stages with only one game played out of sixteen on the fixture list, but the very plausible excuse that the first t20 match was played on the back of 16 days playing Championship cricket on the road with no time to prepare has now ceased to be valid.

A second defeat at Trent Bridge against another fancied side would not be fatal to Yorkshire's chances, but would be a severe blow. 

Yorkshire were missing a big hitter down the order on Friday - someone who could clear the fence rather than score in ones and twos. Ajmal Shahzad will miss the match with an ankle injury, whereas Gary Ballance and Azeem Rafiq were the other two players who did not feature in the opening t20 game.

JAMES BUTTLER