Captain Sam Northeast helped put the disaster of Lord’s in the archives as he starred with a personal best T20 score 96 off only 47 balls at a 5000-strong crowd at The County Ground, Beckenham on Friday night.

Northeast’s knock – a record individual score for a Kent batsman at Beckenham overtaking Martin Van Jaarsveld’s 82 in 2010 – was ably supported by Fabian Cowdrey who contributed 42 off 32 balls. Their partnership adding 98 in only nine overs.

Despite the heavy rain at intervals throughout the day in BR3 and which caused a 25 minute delay to proceedings, the crowd warmed to the prospect of a T20 return to Beckenham and weren’t disappointed as The Spitfires delivered.

Winning the toss Northeast elected to bat first and Kent helped themselves to their highest T20 score against Surrey and their highest innings total at The County Ground, Beckenham, with the win seeing them go top of the South Group.

Despite losing Daniel Bell-Drummond (5) early-on, Kent showed their intent hitting ex-player Azhar Mahmood for 24 runs in the third over of the innings – Mahmood under pressure bowled a no-ball which went for mid-wicket six bringing about a free hit to boot which subsequently went for four.

By the end of the six-over powerplay Kent had moved on to 60/3 with a slight wobble losing Joe Denly (20) and Sam Billings (5) in consecutive overs but this brought together Northeast and Cowdrey to take the game to the visitors as the two of them played a combination of shots to keep the scoreboard ticking over from singles to big sixes all around the ground much to the crowd’s delight – Northeast’s half century duly arrived off only 22 balls.

At the halfway stage in proceedings Kent had amassed 118/3 – The Spitfires’ 100 brought up by Northeast clubbing Ansari’s first ball for six in an over that cost 20 runs and whilst the introduction of James Burke and reintroduction of Moises Henriques threatened to stem the runs, it was only temporary as Kent pushed on with 150 up in the 14th over.

Surrey finally ended the key partnership as Cowdrey (156/4) was caught at point with out-of-sorts Darren Stevens (1) soon returning (159/5) but The Spitfires continued as Mahmood again bowled a no-ball for a free hit – caught by Dunn on the boundary – but the ball’s and his own momentum saw the fielder topple over backwards and over the rope for six runs. Mahmood made amends getting the wicket of Blake (2) with Matt Coles (0) offering a top-edged caught and bowled to Curran.

The typical end of innings flurry of runs and wickets continued and in the final over, with all eyes on Northeast and a prospective century, he holed out over mid-wicket but was caught on the boundary for 96 by Jason Roy. In came Mitch Claydon who finished the innings with a top-edged four over the wicketkeeper’s head – 193/8.

In Surrey’s reply, Matt Coles’ opening over proved disastrous with the loss of two wickets – Roy started well hitting Coles for consecutive fours but then fell for eight and new batsman Kumar Sangakkara called for a quick single but the athletic and diving Northeast ran out Steve Davies at the strikers-end before the opener had a chance to face a ball – Surrey were 8/2 after the opening over.

The visitors recovered from their early losses and by the end of the six-over powerplay had reached 59/3 – In the last over of the powerplay Darren Stevens got the dangerous Sangakkara (34 off 19 balls). Kent were 60/3 the same stage as the game was finely poised.

Australian debutant Henriques who had performed well with the ball earlier in the evening, looked to establish himself with the bat during a fine spell of bowling by the hosts – Cowdrey, Stevens and Calum Haggett turned the screw on Surrey giving little away with the visitors hundred coming up in the 12th over – 43 runs off six post-powerplay overs – The hundred coming up in unusual circumstances as Cowdrey bowled a hat-trick of wides but the youngster re-focussed and in an exciting 14th over Joe Denly caught, but then dropped the dangerous-looking Henriques (41) but Cowdrey wasn’t to be denied in a two-wicket over as Gary Wilson (23) was stumped by Billings (115/4) with Ansari (0) done but the double-act, caught this time by ‘Bilbo’.

Surrey now 115/5 with six over’s remaining needing 79 to win looked to pepper the boundary with fours and sixes but solid Kent bowling and fielding gave the visitors little hope, strangling the batsmen as the required run-rate increased, increasing the pressure on Mahmood and Henriques and with four overs remaining (24 balls) and fifty runs needed, Mahmood (18) lost his nerve to Haggett – Henriques later in the over hit Haggett’s penultimate ball for six but this was the final maximum of the Surrey innings.

Claydon, bowling the 18th over, didn’t take a wicket but to only go for five runs (all singles) made the game all but safe meaning Coles came in to the penultimate over of the innings with Surrey needing 37 and in bowling tightly in the early part of the over got the wicket of Henriques (63), leaving Surrey 164/7 – Thirty runs from their target with only seven balls left to bowl – Moises Henriques struck four-fours and four sixes in a 47 ball innings but any lingering hope had now been extinguished.

Claydon came in to bowl the final over knowing he had a 28 run cushion but remained focussed as his first five deliveries all went for singles in a fine display of ‘death-bowling’ and finished with a flourish as Burke (8) holed out with the final ball of the innings top-edging to give Billings the simplest of catches – once the skied effort came back down to earth.

Kent winning the game by twenty-three runs and topping the South Group now head to Taunton to face Somerset on Sunday and West Indian T20 specialist Chris Gayle.

 

Teams:

 

Kent: Bell-Drummond, Denly, Northeast, Billings, Stevens, Cowdrey, Blake, Coles, Haggett, Riley, Claydon

 

Surrey: Roy, Davies, Sangakkara, Wilson, Ansari, Henriques, Mahmood, Batty, Curran, Burke, Dunn

 

Scores:

 

Kent: 193/8 (Northeast 96, Cowdrey 42; Curran 3/31, Dunn 2/20, Henriques 2/24)

 

Surrey: 170/8 (Henriques 63, Sangakkara 34; Coles 2/36, Cowdrey 2/40)

 

Result:

 

Kent (2pts) beat Surrey (0) by 23 runs