Kentish Gazette Canterbury & District
Spitfires fall short again despite Stevens heroics
FIXTURES
Darren Stevens hit the highest one-day score in Kent history but it could not prevent defeat to Glamorgan in Sunday’s Royal London One-day Cup game at Swansea. The 41-year-old all-rounder marked his 300th List A appearance by smashing a career-best 147 from just 67 balls but the Spitfires fell 16 runs short of victory after allowing their hosts to reach 356-7. Stevens raced to his seventh List A century from just 48 deliveries and hit 10 fours and 14 sixes to surpass his previous List A career best of 133. It also KENT’S NEXT FIVE GAMES
CC2 May 26 Sussex (Tun Wells)............ CC2 June 8 Durham (Canterbruy)....... Division 2 Key: CC2 = Specsavers County Championship surpassed Kent’s white-ball record of 146, scored by Andrew Symonds against Lancashire at Tunbridge Wells in 2004. The 35 sixes scored in the match equalled a county record. Matt Coles (2-32) and James Tredwell (0-56) were the only bowlers to escape punishment as Colin Ingram (114) smashed eight maximums and Will Bragg added 94 off 101 balls. In the reply, along with Stevens’ heroics, cameos from Matt Coles (26 off 18 balls) and James Tredwell (28 off 25 balls) got the Spitfires in sight of victory before Tredwell was run out trying to get last-man Ivan Thomas off strike with 16 runs required and 16 balls to spare. The defeat was rock-bottom Kent’s sixth in seven South Group games. Despite an eye-catching return from Sam Billings, the Spitfires fell short against Surrey on Friday. Billings back from IPL and England duty – scored 69 from 65 balls but the Spitfires lost by 44 runs at the Oval. Ben Foakes (82 not out) helped Surrey rally from 141-5 to reach 251-7 in an innings reduced to 41 overs by rain. In reply, Kent mustered only 204 all out from 35.4 overs as they chased a Duckworth-lewis target of 249. Joe Denly made 34 but Kent were 170- 6 with 10 overs left and their hopes were ended when Billings pulled Sam Curran to his brother Tom at long leg after a knock featuring three sixes. Kent allowed another winning position to slip as they crashed to an 11-run defeat against Gloucestershire at Bristol last Wednesday. Michael Klinger’s 134 was the foundation of a challenging Gloucestershire total of 275- 8 – although his side lost five wickets for the addition of just 15 runs in the final 14 balls with Matt Coles taking 4-57. Daniel Bell-drummond followed up his tons against Somerset and Sussex with 90, and Sean Dickson (50) and Sam Northeast (44) put Kent on track to cruise home. However, from 200-2 in the 39th over, the visitors collapsed spectacularly, closing on 264-9 with Chris Liddle claiming 5-36.