The BBL were already enjoying a season of comebacks, but Stephen Smith produced one of their best performances in front of a packed SCG to keep the Sydney Sixers in contention for the top spot.
Smith adjusted that number after scoring his 100th ball of 56th in his game against the Strikers against Adelaide, where he delighted the majority of the 38,757 crowd. A slightly delayed start meant the match went to 19 overs for him, with rain temporarily threatening the event. It ruined it even though I was battling cramps earlier in the day.
Smith finished the game with his 125* off his 66 balls and filled with 9 of his 6s. This was a career-best of his 125*, but City rivals Thunder had no answer as they dominated his second wicket of 155 for captain Moises his Henriquez and undefeated. He became the second player to score hundreds of goals in a row for the BBL, after Ben McDermott.
However, the overall controversy peaked in Smith’s innings. The contrast with David Warner was striking. The Thunder never tried to impress the target, so it took him 17 balls to find the boundary.
sensational schmidt
After the Sixers decided to bat, Smith quickly picked up momentum and on the second ball he carved to 4 and played an excellent backfoot his drive against Chris Green in the second set. He then swept Daniel Sams in the stands to record his first six.
Home his side were briefly pushed back when Grinda Sandu scored his two goals in his four overs.
There was a period of strengthening in which three overs from fifth to seventh brought no boundaries before Smith grounded Joel Davis head-on. This meant a change of gear for Smith, going from 31 to 50 balls in the over and putting Sams back in the stands.
At his 51, Smith was given one life when Usman Kadir spilled his catch back after suffering a painful blow to the hand. Smith in his 90s he recorded 2 6-of-3 and put himself in front of Sandu in 15 overs before hitting Qadir on a wide long on.
Smith’s 125* surpassed Shane Watson’s 124 against India in 2016, SCG’s best of his T20 innings, and his performance, albeit for logical reasons, was Australia’s third. highlighted his failures on his T20 side.
Enrique’s painful supporting role
Although the Sixers captain received some beatings for his efforts, he had one of the best seats in the house. He struggled a bit early on, having 19-15 balls, but was well past Qadir.
In the 14th round, he received a painful blow to the jaw when a shot from the outfield bounced off the sideline and missed his helmet. In his second-to-last round, he was in line of fire from Smith himself when a mighty drive from Sams hit him in the thigh at the end of the non-striker.
Ultimately, the third wicket tally finished as his second highest sixer in the BBL, making it the highest partnership for that wicket in tournament history.
Warner fights as Thunderslide
With Warner’s return to his BBL after a much longer hiatus than Smith, the Thunder didn’t reap nearly as much. He couldn’t do much against the Yorker he got from Riley Meredith against the Hobart Hurricanes and played a useful hand against the Melbourne Renegades.
He often didn’t get much from his strikes, and when he fell in the 10th over, he was facing only 23 balls. Finally, he spooned a catch legside against the sly Steve O’Keeffe when the Thunder’s chase went into a heap. Warner’s final tally was his double-digit innings in his T20, his third slowest in his career.
The Thunder have struggled batting a lot this season, but he’s got one game left to go to the finals.
Lyon sits down again
This is an observational article at the moment, and there are no major concerns. For the second game in a row, Nathan Lyon was forced to sit on the sidelines as medical staff checked for a wobbly knee, described as inflammation of the lateral meniscus.
He will be reassessed ahead of the Sixers’ final regular-season game against the Hobart Hurricanes on Monday, but the nearness of the Indian tour and the fact that the Sixers are well stocked for weirdos. , so the risk won’t be taken, at least for now. They will have to use their bench strength when both Lyon and Todd Murphy, who rolled quite properly in that game, left for India. Smith will be gone by then, but he definitely left his mark on this year’s tournament.