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Batters cash in again as Glamorgan face uphill battle to salvage draw

ECB Reporters Network21-Jul-2022Glamorgan face an uphill battle to emerge with even a draw after Leicestershire built their highest total on this ground since 2004 on day two of their LV= Insurance County Championship match.No Foxes side has prospered to the same degree since a Brad Hodge double century helped them pile on 634 against Durham 18 years ago. Wiaan Mulder added only nine to his overnight 147 but Ben Mike’s 91 and a debut half-century from former Glamorgan bowler Roman Walker turned the screw before Callum Parkinson’s side were dismissed for 584, just a week after their record-breaking 756 for four against Sussex in Hove.A good pitch and a fast outfield meant Glamorgan’s bowlers had little margin for error, their mood not helped by some poor fielding that saw as many as seven catching chances go begging. Offspinner Andrew Salter’s four wickets cost 158 runs, albeit from 42 overs.After losing both openers before they had reached double figures in their reply, Glamorgan had recovered to 111 for 2 when bad light brought an early close, with Sam Northeast on 50, but needed to reach 435 just to avoid the follow-on.The day had begun with Leicestershire adding only a single to their overnight score before Harry Swindells was caught at second slip from a ball that climbed on him more than he expected, giving Michael Hogan a third wicket.Related

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The Mulder-Swindells partnership had added 138. Leicestershire notched a fifth batting bonus point for only the second time this season as Mike arrived full of intent, the allrounder hammering three fours in an over to end Hogan’s first spell of the day.Michael Neser ended Mulder’s fine if not faultless innings moments after he had gone past 150 as the South African, perhaps weary from his exertions of the day before, was bowled between bat and pad. The breakthrough gave Glamorgan an opportunity to stem the damage. In the event, Mike inflicted more, albeit with a few slices of luck before he was out for 91.Spared on 43 after Hogan and Eddie Byrom left it to one another to take the catch when he top-edged James Harris, he survived a half-chance back to the bowler against Kiran Carlson’s offspin on 56 and was carelessly spilled by Harris himself at mid-on off Hogan on 70.Mike regained his momentum after a period of circumspection, yet missed out on a maiden first-class century for the second time this season. Left stranded on 99 not out when he ran out of partners against Middlesex at Lord’s in April, he moved into the 90s with four boundaries in as many overs here only to take one liberty too many with Salter, falling to a catch at long-on with the prize there for the taking.The eighth wicket added 115, and though Parkinson was soon back in the pavilion as ninth man out after David Lloyd took a stunning catch at slip off Salter, there was time for Walker – making his first-class debut a year after moving to Grace Road from Glamorgan – to complete a 79-ball maiden fifty and benefit from another error in the field as Billy Root dropped him on 52 at deep midwicket, and for Chris Wright to survive a simple caught-and-bowled chance to Colin Ingram on 14 as the last wicket added another 45.Lloyd, who survived beyond the first ball of Glamorgan’s reply only because Wright’s overstepping invalidated Louis Kimber’s brilliant catch at third slip, departed 18 balls later when Kimber reprised the moment to give Walker his maiden first-class wicket. Byrom was taken low down at second slip off Wright but Ingram and Northeast played positively, adding 102 before play was called off with 12 overs left of the day’s schedule.

Mahmudullah, who was initially rested for the T20I series, has been brought into the squad as Nurul’s replacement

Mohammad Isam01-Aug-2022Allrounder Mosaddek Hossain will lead Bangladesh in the third T20I against Zimbabwe after Nurul Hasan was ruled out of the series with an injured index finger he sustained during the second game on Sunday. Mahmudullah, who is already in Zimbabwe for the ODI series, has been named Nurul’s replacement in the T20I squad.Mahmudullah, who was replaced as T20I captain for the series, was part of the senior group of players who were rested for this tour. Bangladesh are without a number of experienced players in the series including Shakib Al Hasan and Mushfiqur Rahim, while Tamim Iqbal retired from the format in July.Mosaddek, who took career-best figures of 5 for 20 in the second T20I against Zimbabwe, has captaincy experience in domestic cricket. He has led Abahani in white-ball formats 36 times since 2019 and has also captained the Sylhet Thunder franchise during the 2019-20 Bangladesh Premier League. Mosaddek has also led Bangladesh A in two matches and has been captain for six first-class matches for Barishal Division and Central Zone in domestic cricket.Nurul had fractured his left index finger while keeping against fast bowler Hasan Mahmud towards the end of the Zimbabwe innings in the second T20I.Bangladesh bounced back from a 17-run defeat in the first T20I to win the second game convincingly and level the series 1-1. They will play the third and the final T20I on Tuesday, which will be followed by three ODIs in Harare.

The top two teams in the eight-team event will qualify for the 2023 T20 World Cup in South Africa

ESPNcricinfo staff31-Aug-2022Abu Dhabi will host the Women’s T20 World Cup Qualifier from September 18 to 25. The top two teams taking part in the eight-team event will qualify for the 2023 Women’s T20 World Cup, which is set to be held in South Africa.The eight teams taking part in the Qualifier have reached the tournament via different routes. Bangladesh and Thailand, who took the two spots reserved for the bottom two teams from the previous edition of the Women’s T20 World Cup in 2020, are also the highest-placed teams on the ICC Women’s T20I rankings behind the eight automatic qualifiers for the World Cup.Scotland (Europe), Zimbabwe (Africa), United Arab Emirates (Asia) and United States of America (Americas) won their respective regional qualifiers, while Papua New Guinea qualified as the highest-ranked team from the East Asia Pacific region, since that regional qualifier had to be scrapped due to the Covid-19 pandemic.Ireland, meanwhile, were the highest-ranked team from the regional qualifiers to not win their respective tournament.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

The teams have been divided into two groups, with Bangladesh, Ireland, Scotland and USA in Group A and Thailand, Zimbabwe, PNG and UAE in Group B. The top two teams in each group will go through to the semi-finals, with the winners of each semi-final progressing to the final and next year’s World Cup.All matches in the Qualifier will be played at the Abu Dhabi Cricket & Sports Hub, which houses both the Sheikh Zayed Stadium and the adjoining Tolerance Oval.Hosts South Africa, as well as Australia, England, India, New Zealand, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and West Indies, have all qualified automatically for the World Cup on the basis of their T20I rankings.

A player featuring in Quaid-e-Azam Trophy will now get a match fee of PKR 100,000. For white-ball games, the figure is PKR 60,000

Umar Farooq24-Sep-2022The PCB has announced an increment in its domestic players’ monthly retainers and match fee, across all formats and levels, for the 2022-23 season.As per the new financial model, a player featuring in the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy will now get a match fee of PKR 100,000 as opposed to the previous PKR 60,000. Those playing the white-ball tournaments – the Pakistan Cup and the National T20 – will now earn PKR 60,000 per game instead of PKR 40,000.The non-playing members of a squad will get PKR 40,000 and PKR 20,000 per match in red and white-ball cricket respectively.Pakistan’s domestic season started on August 30 with the National T20; those who participated in it did so without a contract. ESPNcricinfo understands that the PCB’s domestic and high-performance centre was waiting for the Board of Governors (BoG) to approve the new model. Those who have played in the National T20 will get their match fee as per the new structure.In all, the PCB will offer contracts to 192 players across five categories. Fifteen players will be in category A+, 35 in category A, 48 in category B, 70 in category C and 24 in category D. The board is yet to announce the names of the contracted players.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

“Domestic cricket is the backbone of Pakistan cricket and we need to continue to invest in it to make it a stronger and more attractive brand,” Nadeem Khan, the High Performance director, said in a press release. “In this relation, I am grateful to the BoG for supporting and approving the management’s recommendations. I am sure these new financial incentives will take our domestic cricket forward and assist the PCB in further reducing the gap with international cricket.”The retainers and match fees have been increased to motivate and inspire cricketers to work harder round the year to maintain the required and expected levels of fitness and form, which forms the basis of retaining places in the contract list. Besides, the new incentives will also encourage them to give preference to our tournament over foreign leagues. Needless to remind everyone, PCB domestic events are a pathway to selection in the national side.”In 2019, the PCB did away with its traditional regional and department team model and narrowed down the national pipeline into six associational teams representing all six provinces in the country. That resulted in over 120 players missing out on playing domestic cricket.ESPNcricinfo Ltd

Currently, with six elite and six second XI teams, with each having 16 players, the number of active domestic players is 192. Earlier, it was over 300.The PCB insisted that with its new financial model, a domestic player can earn way more than what he was earning previously. After the latest increment, if an A+ category player plays all matches in the season, including the finals, he could earn PKR 6.1 million. The corresponding figure for a D category player will be PKR 4.3 million.Earlier this year, the PCB brought in several changes to the domestic structure for the 2022-23 season, where 187 matches will be played across formats over five months. The season will end in the first week of January, unlike previous ones when it stretched till March.

They beat a Western Australia Cricket Association XI by 13 runs with Arshdeep Singh also making a mark

PTI and ESPNcricinfo staff10-Oct-2022Suryakumar Yadav continued his good form as the Indian team beat the Western Australia Cricket Association XI by 13 runs in its first practice game ahead of the T20 World Cup, in Perth on Monday.The Indian team, which has been training at the WACA for the past three days, wanted to get used to the pace and bounce of the track. They made 158 for 6 in their stipulated 20 overs and in reply, the WACA XI managed only 145 for 8 in their 20 overs.Instead of captain Rohit Sharma’s regular partner KL Rahul, it was Rishabh Pant, who opened the innings for the visitors. But it was Suryakumar, whose 35-ball 52 was the highlight of the innings as a few hundred fans enjoyed his free-flowing strokeplay. He hit three fours and as many sixes during his knock and not for once did the pace and bounce of the track looked like troubling the world No. 2 ranked T20I batter.The other man, who made a significant contribution, was allrounder Hardik Pandya who scored 27 off 20 balls. Deepak Hooda, having recently recovered from injury, also chipped in with 22 off 14 balls at No. 3.India were 28 for 2 in the powerplay before Suryakumar’s intervention. His wicket, in the 18th over, left India at 129 for 5 but the last 16 balls yielded 29 runs and got them closer to the 160-run mark.Defending the total against a WACA XI wasn’t a big ask as Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Arshdeep Singh basically blew away the home team’s top-order inside the powerplay. WACA XI were reduced to 12 for 4 in the third over and they could never recover from the setback.Arshdeep was the best Indian bowler on view with impressive figures of 3 for 6 from three overs, while Bhuvneshwar (2 for 26) and Yuzvendra Chahal (2 for 15) also chipped in.India’s next practice game against the same opposition is on October 13 before the team travels to Brisbane for two official T20 World Cup warm-up games against Australia and New Zealand.

Opener’s run-out for 60 turns rain-hit game as India win thriller to go to the top of Group 2

Andrew Fidel Fernando02-Nov-20223:19

Tom Moody: ‘Virat Kohli looks at the game differently from 99.9% of batters’

Litton Das run out. How many people will be talking about it tomorrow? In Dhaka, in Chattogram, and in Sylhet. India had made a commanding total of 184 for 6, thanks mainly to a superlative return to the runs for KL Rahul (50 off 32), and another chapter in Virat Kohli’s spectacular form, as he made 66 not out off 44. Suryakumar Yadav’s 30 off 16 helped too.But when Litton blasted seven fours and three sixes inside the first seven overs, Bangladesh had an excellent foundation. They were 66 for no loss when rains interrupted and curtailed the match. At that time, Najmul Hossain Shanto, Litton’s opening partner, was seven off 16.They should have been confident of scoring the 85 needed off the last nine overs (54 balls) upon resumption, particularly as the field was likely to be greasy following the downpour. But when Shanto called for a tight second, two balls into resumption, Litton’s spikes failed to adequately grip the damp surface he was running on, and he was out by a about a metre to an outstanding Rahul direct hit, from just beyond midwicket.Bangladesh lost their way after that, even if they rallied slightly towards the end to keep the last over interesting. They lost six wickets for 40 runs, in 33 deliveries. Nurul Hasan did his best to perform a miracle, but his 25 off 14 was not enough. Arshdeep Singh delivered excellent yorkers at the death, and India secured a hard-fought five-run victory, which took them to the top of Group 2.Related

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• Litton comes out of his shell and shows the way for Bangladesh

• 'We didn't talk about it being fair or unfair' – Shakib on resumption of play in slippery conditions

Litton’s hope-giving barrage
Man really set Bangladesh up. Then got out in an incredibly frustrating manner, which he bore little blame for.The game was on when he hit Arshdeep for three fours in the second over – the first past backward point, the second down the ground, the third crashed through extra-cover.He kept nailing them. Bhuvneshwar Kumar got swivel-pulled into the stand beyond deep square-leg. Then, the best shot of the game, perhaps, came: Litton got low and scooped Bhuvneshwar over the shoulder for six in the bowler’s next over.By the time the Powerplay ended, he had completed a 21-ball fifty, and Bangladesh were flying. After seven overs, they were 66 for 0 – 17 runs ahead of the Duckworth-Lewis-Stern par score, when the rains came down and forced a long break. Litton had 59 off 26 then.But then, second ball after resumption, he ran a second upon his partner Shanto’s insistence, and he slipped on the now-damp surface, causing him to lose valuable metres. The direct hit from Rahul caught him a metre short. This was when the chase turned.1:36

Moody: Litton aside, Bangladesh went about their power-hitting the wrong way

Rahul’s resurgence
He’d made three single-figure scores in a row, but given his half-centuries in the warm-ups, could you really call this a dip? Either way, Rahul smote two spectacular sixes in the powerplay to suggest he was never out of touch. The first was a languid pick-up shot over deep square leg off Shoriful Islam. The second – the best of them all – was a supremely timed square-cut off Hasan Mahmud that flew into the stands. He hit two more sixes later, and was out in the 10th over, having proven his worth.Kohli’s anchor
If you’re going to drop anchor, this is the way to do it. You bat in your more-aggressive team-mates’ slipstream. And then you make sure you catch up. Even at the end of the 14th over, Kohli was 32 off 28 – not a particularly impressive score. But then where other anchor-role players frequently fail to kick on from here, Kohli excels at surging through the late overs. This time, he struck four fours and a six through the last six overs, to end up a strike rate of 145.45. This tournament, he has 220 runs at a strike rate of 144.73 and has been dismissed just once in four innings.Bangladesh’s post-Litton fade
Before Litton was run-out, Bangladesh struck 67 from 43 deliveries, and they’d lost no wickets. In the 34 balls after he got out (not including the dismissal delivery), Bangladesh lost five wickets and made only 40 runs. This essentially, was where Bangladesh truly lost it – Arshdeep and Hardik Pandya bowling double-wicket overs.Shanto tried to revive Bangladesh’s hopes, but India always seemed the likelier winner.

The duo added 124 to go past Hurricanes’ highest T20 total

AAP05-Jan-2023Matthew Short celebrated his captaincy debut with a heroic, maiden T20 ton to help Adelaide Strikers pull off the greatest run chase in BBL history.After Hurricanes posted an imposing 229 for 4, Short crunched Pakistan allrounder Faheem Ashraf for back-to-back boundaries in the 20th over to raise his century and victory by seven wickets with three balls to spare.With regular skipper Peter Siddle sidelined, Short celebrated his temporary elevation to the captaincy role by crunching 100 not out off 59 balls.Scratchy early, Short received two lives off Riley Meredith’s bowling – dropped by Mitchell Owen first ball and a sitter by Nathan Ellis on 22 – and he made Hurricanes pay.After the early departure of Ryan Gibson, Short and Chris Lynn, who made 64, added 124 off 58 balls for the second wicket to turn Strikers’ dream into a reality.Lynn smashed four sixes in his whirlwind 29-ball knock before falling to the impressive spinner Patrick Dooley during the power surge.On 20, English import Adam Hose holed out to Tim David at mid-on but was reprieved when third umpire Eloise Sheridan deemed Faheem’s full toss to be above waist height.Hose duly belted the free hit for six, one of three he struck in Faheem’s over, which reaped 22. Hose eventually fell for 38 before an even higher high full toss from the struggling Faheem in the 20th over conceded another free hit, allowing Short to pounce.Dooley suffered a nasty injury to his left shoulder while diving to save a boundary in the 19th over, compounding the pain for Hurricanes who looked in an impregnable position at the halfway mark.Half-centuries to Ben McDermott (57), Caleb Jewell (54) and Zak Crawley (54*) underpinned Hurricanes’ record score.They smoked 14 sixes in their innings and appeared on track to make it two wins over Strikers in five days, while consigning the home side to a fourth successive defeat before Short stole the show.

The allrounder will bring his superb career to an end at the conclusion of the current BBL

ESPNcricinfo staff21-Jan-2023Dan Christian, one of the most decorated T20 cricketers in history, has announced he will retire at the conclusion of the ongoing BBL with Sydney Sixers.Currently Christian, 39, has played 405 T20s amassing 5809 runs and taking 280 wickets. Selection permitting, he will have at least four more matches with Sixers guaranteed two shots at reaching the BBL final having finished in the top two of the regular season.”Yesterday at training I told my Sydney Sixers team-mates that I’ll be retiring from playing at the end of the BBL season,” Christian posted on Twitter on Saturday morning. “Sydney Smash tonight, followed by our last round game against the Hurricanes, and then the finals.”Hopefully we can go all the way again this season, but regardless, it’s been a great run. I’ve achieved things and made some memories that I could only have dreamt of as a kid.”
Christian has enjoyed success all around the world over the last decade as his career became increasingly focused on T20. Since 2010, he has won nine domestic T20 titles, most recently the 2020-21 BBL with Sixers, two years after he helped Melbourne Renegades to the prize.Those two BBL campaigns showed the impact Christian can have: in 2018-19 for Renegades he made 254 runs and claimed 15 wickets (including being player of the match in the low-scoring final) then in 2020-21 hit 272 runs with a strike-rate of 182.55 and claimed 15 wickets.His last first-class match came in 2018 although there was a surprise return to Australia’s ODI side in 2021 when he played against West Indies in the Caribbean with the side missing several first-choice players due to Covid restrictions.Dan Christian’s T20 titles•ESPNcricinfo Ltd

He returned to T20I cricket at the same time, after a gap of four years, featuring against West Indies and Bangladesh before being named as a reserve for Australia’s 2021 T20 World Cup campaign.”What I didn’t expect to learn as a kid though, is how many people I was going to come in contract with that have had an influence on my career and ended up becoming lifelong friends,” he added. “I’m looking forward to now having the time to catch up with you all and not having to use the excuse: “Sorry, I’ve got cricket.”Christian is a chance to head into coaching. He worked as a coaching consultant for the Netherlands at the recent T20 World Cup in Australia.

Australia left the ground on Tuesday still in the dark over which of the two surfaces would be used for the match

Andrew McGlashan08-Mar-20235:23

Will Ahmedabad give the best batting pitch of the series?

Steven Smith could not remember another occasion where he had been unsure which pitch he would be playing on for a Test match two days out from it starting.That was the situation which emerged on Tuesday in Ahmedabad with Australia leaving the ground still in the dark over which of the two surfaces would be used for the final Test. However, after the visitors had departed the picture became clearer. India’s hierarchy focused their attention on the drier, black-soil pitch, instead of the red-soil one which also appeared significantly greener – although the groundsman had told Smith both would have been significantly trimmed of grass.”[There] might have been a couple of [pitches] prepared maybe a bit longer out than two days but I can’t remember two days,” Smith said.Related

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Even by the time Australia had finished training on Tuesday, around four hours after arriving at the ground, the likely Test pitch had already started to change character.”I didn’t go out and have a look in the afternoon but Alex Carey did,” Smith said. “It looked completely different, a lot drier in the afternoon. It’s very hot here, 37 degrees, which gives it a chance to dry out and I think that the cover was on for a bit today. So they’re potentially worried that it’s drying out too much. It certainly changed in a few hours. Having a look today we’ll be able to potentially see what it’s going to do.”With three three-day Tests so far – and the latter barely reaching that far – this series is well on track to finish with the fewest balls bowled in a four-match series. However, Smith said the groundsman had indicated that this game would go longer than the othersIt all points to Australia again fielding three frontline spinners particularly now Cameron Green is available to balance the side. He was only needed for two overs in Indore, while Mitchell Starc was called on for 12.Smith took the opportunity for a little swipe at some of the punditry that suggested Australia should have stuck to their fast-bowling strengths with three quicks and just one spinner. That was the model which brought the 2004 series victory but on very different surfaces.Scott Boland partnered with Pat Cummins in Nagpur before Cummins was the lone quick in Delhi. Then Starc and Green both returned in Indore. Victory in the third Test has left the team with a sense of vindication that their planning has been correct.”It’s been weird with a bit of the commentary back home, people talking about us playing three quicks and one spinner,” Smith said. “It’s kind of mind-boggling to me when we look at these surfaces and we see what we’ve had, 11 innings in six days or something like that, and spinners have taken the bulk of the wickets and you see how difficult it is to play the spin.”It’s kind of odd to hear that kind of commentary, but we’ve had faith in what we’re trying to do and it’s good that we are able to show that we can play with three spinners and win. We weren’t too far away in Delhi either, outside of that hour of madness. Nice to know our plans and everything we are trying to do can work.”

Smith looks for more lower-order runs

One area where Smith would like to see improvement is the productivity of the lower order, where India have overwhelmed what Australia have been able to produce. Even in the victory they lost 6 for 11 on the second day.Axar Patel is the second-highest run-getter in the series with 185 runs in four innings at an average of 92.50•BCCI

From No. 8 onwards, India have scored 307 runs at 25.58 in the series compared to Australia’s 84 and 4.94. In comparison, although Rohit Sharma has scored the lone century, the top seven are all-but identical: Australia have made 776 runs at 22.92 and India 709 runs at 22.15.Australia are not expecting the level of contribution that Axar Patel is able to provide – he would not be out of place in the top six – but want to find a way to eke out partnerships.”The tail is something we’ve spoken about, probably as batters [they] haven’t contributed as much as we would have liked,” Smith said. “That’s been a big difference when you see someone like Axar who has been incredibly difficult to get out. And in terms of our top six versus their top six, there’s not a huge difference in averages for the series.”There is a considerable amount at stake in this final match. A 3-1 scoreline would suggest that there is still a gap when playing India in their conditions, albeit not as wide as some had considered, whereas a 2-2 share would be a remarkable outcome for Australia, especially considering where they were after the second Test in Delhi.”I think it would be a huge achievement for this group, or any touring team, that comes here to India and wins two Test matches,” Smith said. “Unfortunately, we weren’t able to do it earlier in the series and give ourselves a chance to win but to draw the series here would be a huge plus and positive.”

Rossington’s 69 in vain as Gladiators smash 60 runs in 3.5 overs to seal a win and keep their chances alive

Danyal Rasool06-Mar-2023For the second time this season, Karachi Kings were on the cusp of victory against Quetta Gladiators, only to watch as Martin Guptill wrenched it violently out of their hands. On February 18, it was a century in the first innings. Today, an unbeaten 56-ball 86 saw Guptill shepherd his side as wickets fell at the other end before cranking through the gears in the final four overs to all but eliminate Kings while keeping the Gladiators’ faint hopes of making it to the playoffs alive.For the first 15 overs of the chase, it was painfully evident why Gladiators find themselves at the wrong end of the points table. There was little by way of intent of quality chasing a below par total against an underwhelming Karachi bowling attack. Mohammad Nawaz, promoted to No. 3 after Omaid Yousaf fell early, only managed a scratchy 15 before Mohammad Musa dismissed him. Iftikhar Ahmed continued to struggle with form, trapped in front by Tabraiz Shamsi; the review had a smaller chance of success than a lottery ticket. Shamsi followed it up by dismissing Najibullah Zadran while James Fuller sent back Umar Akmal cheaply, reducing Quetta to 63 for 5 inside ten overs.Guptill was around at the other end, but there was little to serve as a harbinger of what would follow in the final five overs. Aside from that hundred against Karachi, runs at the PSL haven’t really come for him, a continuation of a trend that has seen him lose form over the last year or so. He had shuffled along to 41 off 40, but the moment he walloped Mohammad Amir for a six in the 16th over, things appeared to fall into place.But the coup de grace was the 17th over, where a hapless Fuller was brutalised for 24 runs in an over, two sixes and three fours changing the course of the game. Musa copped plenty of punishment in the over that followed with another six and four, and Amir leaked 11 in his over to leave eight off the 20th.Sarfaraz Ahmed, who had watched passively from the other end, was run out in a mix-up, but by now, it was too late for Kings. Dwaine Pretorius came in and slapped two boundaries in three balls to seal the win, ensuring Gladiators continue to have hopes of an unlikely final four berth.Earlier, Gladiators had begun well as Naseem Shah removed Kings’ platinum pick Matthew Wade off the first ball. Much of the top order failed to have much of an impact, with Tayyab Tahir and Qasim Akram falling to Aimal Khan, before a sluggish innings from Shoaib Malik ground any Kings momentum to a halt. Any momentum that existed was thanks largely to a lone hand from Adam Rossington, whose 69 formed the spine of the innings, enabling his side to set up for a big finish at the death. That finish was provided by Imad Wasim and Amir Yamin who scored 51 in the final five to give their side a total they could look to defend.For three-quarters of the chase, they were having no problems defending it. But Guptill was a sleeping dragon at that stage, and when he awoke, the Kings could only watch as a wretched PSL campaign went up in smoke.