Kent Spitfires got back to winning ways with an impressive batting display against Hampshire Hawks on Sunday.
After three straight Vitality Blast defeats, Spitfires successfully chased down Hampshire’s 176-6 with eight balls to spare.
Kent skipper Sam Billings opted to bowl first and Keith Dudgeon opened up with a maiden over.
The runs soon started to flow, however, particularly from the bat of James Vince, who greeted Fred Klaassen with three successive boundaries at the start of the fourth over.
Vince’s excellent half-century came up in the final over of the powerplay off 24 balls featuring nine fours and one six as Hawks advanced to 59 without loss in six overs.
Joe Denly finally made the breakthrough at the end of the ninth over, enticing Toby Albert to find the safe hands of Zak Crawley at long-off for 16, with Hampshire already ahead of the curve on 90-1.
The Hampshire hundred came up in the 11th over with Vince scoring 77 of them, having faced 40 balls.
Grant Stewart was belatedly called into the attack in the 13th over and he bowled Vince for 84 off balls with only his second delivery.
Jake Lintott only bowled three overs, conceding 33 runs as Hampshire took advantage of the short leg-side boundary.
Stewart struck again in the 15th over, bowling Joe Weatherley for 24, with Hampshire 136-2.
Hilton Cartwright went down with what initially looked like a bad injury. He continued but was out in the next over, finding Dudgeon at long-on to give Stewart his third wicket and leave Hampshire 142-4 in the 17th.
Stewart, who had only one wicket in his three previous Blast outings this summer, picked up his fourth wicket in the penultimate over, Ben Mayes caught by Crawley for 15. Stewart took some punishment in his final over, going for 15, but still finished with figures of 4-32.
The final over by Klaassen went for just four with Tristan Stubbs run out off the final ball as Hampshire reached 176-6.
Kent’s fifty came up from the final ball of the fifth over before Daniel Bell-Drummond and Harry Finch advanced the score to 60-0 by the end of the powerplay.
The introduction of Liam Dawson saw some control to the run scoring. There was little panic for the Spitfires, although Stubbs put down Bell-Drummond on the deep mid-wicket boundary as they took the score to 83-0 at the halfway stage.
Bell-Drummond reached his first Blast half-century of the summer with a six off Dawson. However, Dawson finally got his man with Bell-Drummond caught in the deep by Fuller for 54 with Kent 95-1 in the 11th over.
Kent’s hundred came up in the 12th over but Crawley never got going and was bowled for four off eight balls by Chris Wood. Spitfires needed 66 off the last six and Billings stepped across his stumps to hit Sonny Baker for successive sixes over deep fine leg. Baker responded with three wides in a row and his over eventually cost him 20 runs.
Dawson switched ends but Billings got the reverse sweep out to hit six and four off successive balls before taking a sensible single from the last ball to lave Kent needing 33 off the last four overs.
Finch and Billings put on 50 in just 22 balls with the former contributing just eight as the Spitfires skipper put his foot on the pedal. But Finch was then bowled by Wood (2-32) for 45 off 43 balls to leave Kent 151-3 in the 17th over.
Denly hit the first ball of Scott Currie’s over for six, leaving Kent needing 18 off 17 and another piece of Billings innovation reduced the requirement to 10 off the last two overs. Billings hit successive boundaries off Baker to complete the win and an unbeaten 21-ball half-century.
