NatWest T20 Blast

Surrey v Gloucestershire

Gloucestershire 154-5; Surrey 155-6

THE hottest day of the year produced a blistering finish for a sell-out crowd at the Kia Oval when Surrey veteran Azhar Mahmood swung the last ball of the match over deep square leg for six to earn his side a dramatic NatWest T20 Blast victory against Gloucestershire by four wickets.

Craig Miles, the highly-promising 20-year-old Gloucestershire fast bowler, was inconsolable as 40-year-old former Pakistan all-rounder Mahmood proved equal to the challenge of needing to hit the final ball of the match for six to take Surrey past their visitors’ 154-5.

Gloucestershire will blame themselves, though, for losing a game which – at the death – they looked like snatching.

Miles had dismissed Zafar Ansari to a catch at fine leg in a good last over, apart from the short final ball, but he also began it with a wide – when Surrey needed nine runs from the last six balls – and, in all, Gloucestershire’s bowlers sent down nine wides and two no balls in the closing overs.

Gloucestershire’s two spinners were excellent and far from wasteful with Tom Smith taking 2-24 and off spinner Jack Taylor 1-22. Kumar Sangakkara top-scored for Surrey with 37 Earlier four Gloucestershire batsmen got into the 30s, but none of them could play the major innings their team wanted as a slow, turning pitch mitigated against explosive shot-making on what is a traditionally fast-scoring ground.

Hamish Marshall and Ian Cockbain hit 32 and 31 respectively in the early overs, while the best partnership of the innings was 62 in eight overs for the fifth wicket between Peter Handscomb, who top-scored with 39 but never really threatened to take the game away from Surrey, and Geraint Jones, unbeaten on 37.

Handscomb hit just three fours and former England wicketkeeper Jones battled on bravely to 37 not out from 31 balls despite needing treatment for a heavy blow in a delicate area when he was pinned by Tom Curran.

A last-over straight six by Jones off the elder of the two Curran brothers was some sort of revenge for him.

But at the end of the Surrey innings the crowd of 23,000 went home happy even though stroke-making excitement – the remarkable finish nothwithstanding – had been in short supply.

Michael Klinger, the Gloucestershire captain who uncharacteristically scored just two, said: “Craig (Miles) bowled a fantastic last over to get them from wanting nine off six balls to six from the last ball. He also executed exactly what we asked him to do with that last ball – so there’s no blame on him.

“We had three young guys bowling the three last death overs, and because of injuries they have had to step up into those roles. It is not easy, and they put in a pretty decent effort.

“We certainly didn’t execute the wide-ish yorkers we were trying to bowl and that did give them quite a few extra runs because of those wides, and extra balls, which made the difference in the end.”