Matt Montgomery hit a sensational unbeaten 92 as the Notts Outlaws beat the Kent Spitfires by one wicket in a Metro Bank Cup thriller at Canterbury.
The visitors overhauled Kent’s 259 for nine with one ball to spare to close on 263 for nine, after a gritty last-wicket stand by Montgomery and his final partner Dane Paterson, who still needed 35 when they came together with five overs remaining.
Hamid Qadri took four for 47 but the hosts were left to rue their failure to build on a first-wicket stand of 138. Lyndon James took four for 45, as Kent fell away after openers Daniel Bell-Drummond and Ben Compton made over half their total, with 79 and 59 respectively.
Montgomery, fittingly, scored the winning runs when he reverse-swept Grant Stewart for four to conclude a stomach-clenchingly tense run chase.
It was a “four-pointer” at the Spitfire Ground, with Kent third in Group A and Notts needing to win both their remaining fixtures to stand any chance of qualifying, having lost their previous three.
The Spitfires chose to bat in front of a crowd of over 3000 on the club’s Community Day and their openers were unmolested during a stand of 138, but for a second consecutive game they failed to really push on once that partnership was broken.
Compton was the first man to go, victim of a sharp caught and bowled by Liam Patterson-White in the 27th over. Bell-Drummond soon followed, caught behind off Tom Loten.
It wasn’t technically a collapse as the next pair of Jack Leaning and Alex Blake put on 33, but the flow of boundaries dried up and the latter was out for 11 when he cut James to Ben Martindale.
James then bowled Leaning for 24 and Harry Finch was run out for nine by Haseeb Hameed chasing a non-existent single after being sent back by his partner Jaydn Denly. Denly at least broke a spell of exactly ten overs without a boundary, but he in turn was stumped for 11 after he came down the wicket to Calvin Harrison.
The first six of the match didn’t arrive till the 46th over, when Grant Stewart creamed Loten over cow corner and as Kent tried a late charge James Bazley was caught and bowled by James for 15.
By the time Stewart was lbw for 25 to Dane Paterson any hopes of a 300 plus score had long since been abandoned. Hamid Qadri was caught by King for three after skying James and it was left to the last wicket pair to milk what they could off the last two overs.
Scoring didn’t seem any easier when Notts were chasing. They were 66 without loss in the 16th when Ben Slater was bowled by Qadri, during a spell when they went 11.5 overs without finding the rope.
In Qadri’s next over he bowled James for eight and Martindale was then run out for 38. He seemed to flinch while anticipating Compton’s throw and couldn’t ground his bat before Nathan Gilchrist broke his wicket.
After a campaign dogged by injury, Gilchrist roared with joy when he bowled Hameed’s middle stump for 27 for only his second wicket of the season, in any format, and his first at Canterbury.
Patterson-White was out for six after he thick-edged Qadri to Blake for six and Sam King was stumped off Parkinson for 12.
When Denly bowled Dane Schadendorf for nine Notts were seven down with 79 needed but
Harrison and Montgomery eroded the target with some clever running, only for the former to cut Qadri straight to Compton at backward point.
Loten was then caught behind off Parkinson but Paterson played sensibly and with an over to go the target was down to seven off Stewart’s 50th over.
Montgomery just blocked the first for a single and Paterson drove the second for four. A single off the third tied the scores. The fourth was a dot and Montgomery then executed a classy reverse-swept four to clinch the win.
Nottinghamshire’s Matt Montgomery said: “I’m obviously over the moon, but there was a stage where we were definitely on the back foot and credit to Dane for coming out there at the end. He made a very crucial 10 or 15 at the end there.
“We always felt we were in touch with the run rate, it was just the wickets that were a bit of an issue.
“Credit to them, they bowled really well and put us under pressure in the middle overs. It came down to the last overs and yeah, I’m glad to have got us over the line. It was a tricky one because you know one ball does it for them, but like I said, Dane came out really switched on and because the run rate wasn’t too out of reach they couldn’t quite bring the field up.
“I had to put quite a bit of trust in him and credit to him, he did a great job. That took a bit of the weight off my shoulders, we took it deep and it happened for us, which was really nice.
“We had a close one against Surrey which we were really, really upset about and it hurt quite a bit, so it’s nice to put that right a bit here. I think we learned a little bit from that so it’s nice to get over the line on this occasion.
“(Lyndon James) bowled beautifully today. We bowled quite nicely up top, I know we didn’t get the wickets, but we kept he run rate under control and then credit to Lyndon, he managed to get the breakthrough, got two wickets in that spell and then got another two at the death. He’s been good at us at the death throughout the tournament so it was nice to see him get his reward. We know we need to win every game, but I don’t think it changes the way you play.”
Kent’s Daniel Bell-Drummond said: “It’s a tough one to take. It was obviously a really exciting game and it’s a shame we came out on the wrong side of it, but three’s a lot of positives to take.
“In the field we were really good defending but I thought we were about 15 or 20 runs short so it was a great effort by the guys to take it so close.
“The pitch was quite nice at the start but then it started to grip a bit more. There was a bit of seam there as well but on the whole it was quite a nice pitch so we were thinking 300, but then as te ball got softer it started to turn more, so really wanted 280 and had to settle for the score we got.
“The guys did really well trying to defend it. We played to our strengths with the spin but knew it was going to be tough with Notts. They played well and Montgomery played a brilliant knock there so we’ve got to hold our hands up.
“The spinners were excellent, they done really well in the tournament and they bowl really well in tandem, as well as Jack Leaning in the power play. They’ve got a great combination going, it’s a shame we couldn’t make it three on the spin, but that’s our plan going forwards.”