Match Report: Kent Spitfires vs. Leicestershire Foxes
Kent Spitfires welcomed Leicestershire Foxes to The County Ground, Beckenham for their home opener in the Metro Bank One Day Cup.
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Roman Walker took six for 43 as the Leicestershire Foxes have thrashed the Kent Spitfires by 264 runs in the Metro Bank One Day Trophy at Beckenham.
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The Foxes skittled Kent for 116, after posting 380 for five.
Earlier Peter Handscomb hit 87 off 67 balls in an innings which saw five Foxes batters make half-centuries. Colin Ackermann was their next highest scorer with 78 not out.
Matt Parkinson took two for 64 on his home debut, but it was an otherwise dismal performance by the hosts, who were eclipsed by Leicestershire in every department.
Kent repented at leisure after choosing to field, as openers Sol Budinger and Rishi Patel put on 116 for the first wicket, before Parkinson intervened at the start of the 18th.
His first delivery as a Kent player on home turf removed Budinger, who was caught by Alex Blake for 67. In his next over Parkinson had Lewis Hill caught on the boundary by Grant Stewart and Hamid Qadri then caught and bowled Patel.
This mini-collapse temporarily slowed the scoring rate and Leicestershire went 10.2 overs without a boundary, but after playing himself in Handscomb launched an aggressive counter-attack that only ended when he holed out to James Bazley and was caught by Nathan Gilchrist.
Wiaan Mulder maintained the momentum with 67 before Bazley had him caught by Blake at cow corner in the final over and when Louis Kimber came in with three balls to spare he hit a six and two fours.
All of which turned out to be overkill.
Kent’s chase suffered an early blow when Chris Wright had Marcus O’Riordan caught behind for seven in the third over.
Jack Leaning and Ben Compton were making a slow recovery when the former went for 25 after he was ruled lbw to a Mulder delivery that looked to be very much going over the top.
From 45 for one the Spitfires started haemorrhaging wickets. Compton had ground out 13 from 31 balls before he miscued Walker and fell to a superb one-handed catch from Hill.
Harry Finch then went to an equally impressive grab from Handscomb for two, after gloving Josh Hull down the leg side and Evison got a duck in the next over, when he toe-ended Roman Walker and was caught behind.
Bazley had made six when he was lbw in Walker’s next over, meaning the Foxes had taken five wickets for 22 runs in just 6.1 overs.
It would have been worse for Kent but having earlier taken a stunning catch Hill dropped a dolly off Hull when Grant Stewart was on 12.
That reprieve counted for little. Although Stewart hit Walker for six over cow corner in the next over, he skied the next delivery straight to Hull at third man, ending the second biggest partnership of the innings.
A crestfallen Beckenham crowd managed some cheers as Kent passed three figures but Hamid Qadri soon went for 13, caught behind off Mulder.
Walker took his fifth wicket when Gilchrist was caught behind off a bottom edge for one and the rout was concluded when Parkinson went for a second ball duck, caught off Walker in the slips by Ackermann.
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Kent’s Matt Parkinson said: “I think the pitch was good the whole day. We were thinking that 350 would have been a decent effort. Obviously there’s things with the ball we could have improved, I don’t think we started that well and we didn’t finish that well, but in the middle myself and Hamid sort of dragged it back a little bit with a few wickets.
“With the bat it’s just one of those classic things where you lose three or four early and you’re done really. It’s disappointing not to have put up more of a fight and got up to 250 or 260 but I wouldn’t read too much into being bowled out for 116. To chase that obviously would have ben a great effort but to do that you need to have wickets in hand and a solid start and we didn’t have that. I thought they bowled well, better than us with the new ball and held their length.
(On his debut wicket) “It wasn’t one of my best deliveries but it was just nice to bowl ten overs. I haven’t bowled a lot recently. I played for Durham at Scarborough and only got two overs, then I only got two overs in last week so to get ten overs was nice, I thought it came out nicely.
“I think it’s a long enough comp that you’re allowed to have performances like this. It’s not as long as the Blast but you do have time to regroup before we go to Blackpool, then the Oval and then here. It’s probably a good learning curve, I think Blackpool will be similar to here, it’s even smaller so we’ll have hopefully have earned our lessons from today
(He is NOT able to play at Lancashire under the terms of the loan agreement)
“I wouldn’t say there’s any split loyalties. I’ll be backing the Kent players to do a job on them. Fingers crossed I can come back for the red ball cricket as well, after the one-day cup finishes. I see myself now as a Kent player.
“It’s above my pay grade, those discussions (on whether he can play in the red-ball run in). It’ll be up to Lancashire really, they hold the power. They were kind enough to let me go to Durham, but fingers crossed I’ll be allowed to play in two of the games. I don’t think I’ll be allowed to play the last game against Lancs.”
