Scorchers open a BBL|13 account by steamrolling Stars.
After defeating the Melbourne Stars by seven wickets at the MCG, the two-time defending champion Perth Scorchers continue to be the KFC BBL standard.
The five-time winners took their winning run against the Stars to six games on Wednesday night after skipping the top order in Melbourne and dismissing them for 101 in 19.1 overs. They did this by scoring 3-102 in 13.5 overs.
In the first BBL match of the season, Brisbane also crushed the Stars by 103 runs last week.
After last Sunday’s absurd match in Geelong against the Melbourne Renegades, which was abandoned after just 6.5 overs due to a soggy pitch, Perth was back to business as usual.
After the Scorchers won the toss and took advantage of the humid conditions, Perth left-arm opening bowler Jason Behrendorff shone with 3-28, including a unique T20 double-wicket maiden.
“It’s a nice start after a false start in Geelong – we talked about being aggressive and throwing the first punch … we did it quite well tonight,” he stated.
The fortunes of the two top orders on Wednesday night clearly differed; the Stars lost their first two wickets in as many overs, while the top three scorers all made at least 20 runs.
While Cooper Connolly, the Stars’ opener, backed up too far on the second ball of the Scorchers innings and would have been well short of a run, the Stars were energetic in the field but failed to capitalize on run-out opportunities.
The innings was led by Connolly’s 20 runs, Stevie Eskinazi’s 25 runs, and Hardie’s 20 at No. 3.
It was a story of near-misses for the Stars in the field: Josh Inglis had made seven at 3-75 after misjudging a spinner Usama Mir delivery, and Haris Rauf had narrowly missed a challenging opportunity.
The match was concluded by Inglish (17no) and Ashton Turner (19no).
In the ninth over, Behrendorff trapped Nick Larkin and Marcus Stoinis, the acting captain of the Stars.
Even though the Scorchers were excellent, the Stars performed badly at bat on a wicket that had been protected for the majority of the previous 48 hours.
Hilton Cartwright top-scored with 24 from 18 balls, while Liam Dawson made 22 at No. 8 and Haris Rauf (8) inspired his teammates by putting on 21 for the final wicket and pushing the score past 100.
A dropped catch and a missed run-out opportunity kept Melbourne from amassing an even more humiliating total.
After taking Cartwright and Usama Mir for his first BBL wickets in the 14th over, left-arm spinner Hamish McKenzie was on a hat-trick, but Joel Paris comfortably defended his opening delivery.
McKenzie, the player of the match, dazzled with a meagre 2–12 off his overs.
Melbourne’s unseasonably cold start to December had raised concerns about rain and lightning postponing the toss, potentially upsetting the match. Thankfully, though, the showers avoided us.
Stoinis led the Stars in the absence of Joe Burns (illness) and Nathan Coulter-Nile (calf) due to Glenn Maxwell’s forearm injury.
