Northern Superchargers 64 for 1 beat London Spirit 111 for 8 (Bopara 31, Jennings 30, Rashid 3-16) by 21 runs via DLS method
Northern Superchargers kept their season alive with a rain-affected victory over London Spirit in the Hundred at Headingley.
They sit second in the table with 11 points, and now face an anxious wait to see if that is enough to secure a place in the knockout stages. They are relying on either Welsh Fire or Manchester Originals doing them a favour in the next two nights, but will be eliminated if those two teams are beaten by Southern Brave and Birmingham Phoenix respectivley. Either way, it is clear progress after they finished bottom last year.
The England legspinner has troubled batters throughout the competition, and on Tuesday night he removed Matt Critchley, Shimron Hetmyer and Andre Russell across 15 balls in the middle of the innings to knock the stuffing out of a Spirit batting effort that was already flattering to deceive.
Truly abject season from London Spirit’s men – and their batters in particular – in the Hundred
– Only win was by three wickets (chasing 95)
– Highest total was 144ao (chasing 167)
– Hetmyer+Russell 216 runs between them (£125k each)
– One individual 50 (Jennings) vs 11 ducks— Matt Roller (@mroller98) August 13, 2024
Liam Dawson has been Spirit’s leading wicket-taker and top run-scorer and once again he shouldered the burden of trying to keep Spirit in the game, his 27 from 19 alongside the veteran Ravi Bopara’s 31 took the visitors into triple figures.But at the interval, the smart money was on the Superchargers.
As it was, their chase was to be limited by the rain, but their openers Graham Clark and Matt Short had done enough to ensure they were miles ahead of Duckworth-Lewis Stern when the game was called off. For Spirit, it was a seventh loss from eight games in a campaign which they will be glad is over.
“I think we’ve got a very good squad, good batters and match-winners all the way through,” Rashid said. “We’ve got a bit of a waiting game tomorrow and Thursday, but hopefully one of those two teams do lose and we’re good.”