Yorkshire v Leicestershire
Vitality Blast, North Group
Sunday May 27, 2022, 3pm
Headingley
Toss: Leicestershire won it and elected to bat
Teams: Yorkshire – Lyth, Malan, Kohler-Cadmore w, Root c, Brook, Khan, Thompson, Bess, Revis, Rashid, Rauf.
Leicestershire – Rutherford, Steel, Lilley, Hill w, Ackermann c, Mike, Patel, Ahmed, Parkinson, Walker, ul-Haq.
Match summary: Yorkshire lost their first game of 2022 as Leicestershire secured victory in a high-scoring Blast fixture, defending 189 to win 31 runs.
The Foxes’ 188-7 included 56 off 33 balls for Colin Ackermann and 57 off 37 for Rishi Patel, the fifth-wicket pair sharing a century partnership. Jordan Thompson claimed three wickets for the Vikings.
Dawid Malan made 50 off 38 balls at the top of the order, while Harry Brook’s 29 saw him pass 1,000 runs for the season in Championship and T20 cricket.
But seamers Ben Mike (3-16) and Naveen-ul-Haq (4-34) were excellent and took regular wickets to stymie Yorkshire’s progress, with them finishing on 157-9.
Report: The Foxes were in trouble at 51-4 in the eighth over, including wickets for Matt Revis, Shadab Khan – his first for the county – Haris Rauf and Adil Rashid.
But Colin Ackermann and Rishi Patel shared a superb 109 for the fifth wicket inside 10 overs and both posted half-centuries to change the complexion of the innings. It was a club record for that particular wicket in T20s.
Both were powerful and inventive; Ackermann hit two sixes down the ground, while Patel swept and reverse swept two of his three sixes, the other going over long-off.
While Rauf was the least expensive of the bowlers with 1-26 from his four, including 15 runs off his last over, Jordan Thompson (3-34) impressed at the death with all three wickets in his last two.
He had Ackermann caught behind at the start of the 18th before taking two wickets in two balls later in the over, but neither counted. One was Ben Mike caught at long-on off a waist high full toss and the other Patel bowled off the subsequent free hit.
But he struck twice in two balls again in the 20th, this time yielding reward as Patel was caught at long-off and Rehan Ahmed at cover (180-7).
Adam Lyth (24) hit four fours and a six in the first 10 balls of the reply, but Yorkshire’s progress was stymied when he drove Mike to cover and Tom Kohler-Cadmore sliced Afghanistan seamer Naveen-ul-Haq to short third, leaving the score at 27-2 in the fourth over.
Malan and Joe Root (17) advanced the Vikings to 77-2 after 10 overs, but both fell inside the next three overs as the score fell to 96-4. Root miscued Mike to cover and Malan also miscued left-arm spinner Callum Parkinson and was caught at short third.
Harry Brook and Khan were in the teens by the time the score reached 120-4 after 15.
Brook uppercut Roman Walker for a huge six over cover before Khan was caught behind off ul-Haq – 136-5 with 53 needed off 20 balls – followed quickly by Thompson’s departure to Mike.
Brook reached the 1,000-run mark, but even his intervention was not enough to see Yorkshire over the line as the Foxes defended 46 off the last two overs and 38 off the last.
In the penultimate, ul-Haq removed Brook caught at long-off for 29 and Dom Bess caught and bowled (145-8).
Magic moment: He really is magic. Upon reaching 28, Harry Brook went to 1,000 runs for the season in Championship and T20 cricket combined in only his 12th innings. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to get Yorkshire over the line, with this 29 his lowest score of the season.
Turning point: The fifth-wicket century partnership between Colin Ackermann and Rishi Patel was the key passage of the match, recovering the Foxes from 51-4 in the eighth over.
Stat of the match: When Adil Rashid trapped Lewis Hill lbw sweeping to leave Leicestershire at 51-4 in the eighth over, it marked the 34-year-old leg-spinner’s 250th career T20 wicket in his 216th career game.
What they said: Yorkshire coach Ottis Gibson said: “Credit to them, I thought they played well. Especially in the second half of the game, they executed their bowling plans well.
“When you analyse the game, I think we lost it in the first half of the game when we didn’t execute our plans as clearly as we should have done.
“36-3 in the powerplay is great, compared to what we did in the first two games. Then 112 in the last 10 overs and for them, who are low on confidence, to get 188 was far too many runs in my opinion.
“It was a used pitch, so you think the spinners might come into it more. But the spinners, between the three of them, went for nearly 100. Talk about execution as a bowling unit, that’s where it was lost I think.
“They also bowled two or three spinners who bowled better than us.
“Look at the game overall, they out-bowled us. That was the difference.”
What’s next: Yorkshire are back in action on Tuesday when Derbyshire Falcons visit Headingley (6.30pm), when David Willey returns as captain following IPL duty.
Harry Brook and Joe Root will miss the game due to England Test duty, but Shadab Khan and Haris Rauf will play before returning to Pakistan for international duties.
It will be Rauf’s last game of the season, but Khan is due to return later in the competition.
