Steyn still has the power

Dale Steyn’s twin strike and Farhaan Behardien’s halfcentury helped the Titans extend their unbeaten record in the franchise T20 competition at St George’s Park on Sunday.

Steyn‚ who missed the Titans’ last three matches in his ongoing rehabilitation from a shoulder injury that kept him out for a year‚ removed openers Rudi Second and Keegan Petersen in the space of three balls of his first over to set the Knights on the rocky path to an underwhelming total of 133/7.

Behardien clipped 56 not out off 39 balls with two fours and three sixes to earn his team victory by five wickets with two balls to spare.

The Titans have now won six of their eight matches. The other two have been washed out.

Steyn‚ who took 2/20 from his four overs‚ reduced the Knights to 8/2 in the first nine balls of the game.

David Miller’s 43‚ Ryan McLaren’s 21 and Grant Mokoena’s 31 helped them avoid embarrassment.

But the Titans’ reply was rocked by the dismissal of Tony de Zorzi‚ Quinton de Kock‚ Henry Davids and Aiden Markram in 11 overs with only 54 runs scored.

That set the scene for a stabilising stand of 38 between Behardien and Albie Morkel‚ and Chris Morris’s 17 not out helped Behardien take the Titans home.

Robbie Frylinck’s hat-trick and batting cameo were not enough to earn the Dolphins their second win of their T20 campaign in the second match at St George’s Park on Sunday.

Instead it was the Warriors who celebrated victory by a solitary run.

Frylinck’s late raid earned him figures of 3/23 and limited the Warriors to 153/8. He then hit an unbeaten 25 off 19 balls in the Dolphins’ reply of 152/7.

The Warriors were rocked by

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the first ball of the match, which Keshav Maharaj snuck between Jon-Jon Smuts’s bat and pad to bowl him.

Colin Ingram and Yaseen Vallie were also sent packing early. Midway through the sixth over the home side were 25/3. But Colin Ackermann and Christiaan Jonker set them straight with a stand of 88, which endured into the 15th over. Were it not for Frylink’s fantasia in the 19th over, the Warriors might have made more of their recovery.

Andrew Birch bowled openers Sarel Erwee and Vaughn van Jaarsveld in three deliveries in the third over of the Dolphins reply and before the end of the seventh they were 35/4.

But opener Morné van Wyk was a thorn in the Warriors’ side until the end of the 18th over for his 57, which ended when he was run out.

That left the Dolphins to score 26 off 12 balls to win, but they fell just short of victory.