- Perth Scorchers v Sydney Sixers – Big Bash final live from the Waca
- Email: geoff.lemon@theguardian.com | Email: @GeoffLemonSport
The team was a hard-luck story after losing the first two BBL finals, but they’ve come back to win three since. Last year was the only time they haven’t featured, when the Thunder beat the Stars. They’re back on the winner’s dais tonight, receiving their medals.
Mitchell Johnson was the early catalyst, giving away nothing in the way of runs, and getting rid of the dangerous Michael Lumb. That wicket came after Ashton Tuner had got rid of Daniel Hughes, and Jyhe Richardson had run out Nic Maddinson with a brilliant throw. It was 3 for 17, but a strong counterattack from Moises Henriques and, especially, Brad Haddin pulled momentum the other way, piling on 57 runs in 6.4 overs – a rate of more than 8 and a half.
Related: Big Bash League: Perth Scorchers beat Sydney Sixers to win crown
Sean Abbott wins the Young Player of the Tournament, and is understated in accepting it. Chris Lynn isn’t present to be named Player of the Tournament, which is an impressive feat considering he only played five of a possible eight matches before finals. Jhye Richardson wins Man of the Match for the final today.
Perth Scorchers chased that down at a rate of 9.09 per over, by the way. Totally dominant.
“Sometimes it comes off, sometimes you get out,” says Klinger philosophically. “Tonight chasing 14o we just thought we were going to come out and take the game away from them. Credit to our bowlers, they set the game up for us and we finished it off. Unbelievable feeling, unbelievable.”
“Our coaching staff is second to none, including our list managers. You think about the guys who’ve missed out, we’ve got guys who can step up.”
15.5 overs: Perth Scorchers 144-1 (Klinger 71, Bell 31)
Botha gets the dubious honour of conceding the losing runs, Klinger gets the better feeling of hitting them. Bell gives him strike, Klinger finds a couple over point, then comes down for one last straight hit for six to end on 71 not out. What an innings.
15th over: Perth Scorchers 135-1 (Klinger 63, Bell 30)
Bell getting into the act now - and why not? No better time. Abbott has had an unhappy day, and all intensity has gone out of the game. Bell gets a full ball and thunders it straight for six. That’s after he hustled another two through point, he’s been excellent picking the gaps today.
14th over: Perth Scorchers 126-1 (Klinger 63, Bell 21)
Lyon continuing, around the wicket to the right-handers, trying to straighten the ball down the line and threaten the stumps. Towel out the back of his black trousers. But he can’t stop the man in form: again it’s Bell two, Bell one, Klinger on strike. And with only a hint of width, Klinger is able to open the face and play the finest of let cuts for four. Lyon has 1 for 28 as his spell for the night wraps up.
13th over: Perth Scorchers 119-1 (Klinger 59, Bell 18)
Well, Klinger doesn’t want to coast. He wants to drive a speedboat off a ramp and land it in the main street. Then reach out and order a malt at the drive through. Before walking away from the damaged vessel, putting on his sunglasses and not even looking back as it explodes. Bell gets a couple through the off side from Dwarshuis, takes another single, then Klinger clouts another straight six to reduce the runs remaining to 23.
12th over: Perth Scorchers 110-1 (Klinger 53, Bell 15)
Henriques is bringing himself on to bowl. Desperation stations: he’s only bowled once this season, that being the semi-final. Took 1 for 15 in two overs against the Stars, got Rob Quiney out. Wanting to try something different I suppose. But it doesn’t really have any effect. Perth are so far ahead of the game that they can afford to coast now. Five singles and a leg bye.
11th over: Perth Scorchers 104-1 (Klinger 50, Bell 13)
Bell has three goes at beating the off-side field facing Dwarshuis, and finally gets one through. Klinger does the same first time. “See? It’s easy. Idiot.” That’s what he says in an alternate timeline. Bells pulls another run. Klinger taps to cover and darts a single to raise his minor milestone. Waves at the crowd briefly then gets back to work.
10th over: Perth Scorchers 100-1 (Klinger 48, Bell 11)
Johan Botha comes on, the kind of containing off-spinner who’s supposed to bring control and parsimony to the innings. But Michael Klinger mishears that as “pass me money”, and makes it rain on the crowd over long-on. Down the pitch and destroyed that ball, such good contact that Botha didn’t even look behind him to see where it had gone. Just wiped his mouth on his sleeve and walked back to his mark like a character at the end of a really depressing European movie. The hundred is up, it’s still 10 per over, and Klinger has a fifty around the corner.
9th over: Perth Scorchers 90-1 (Klinger 39, Bell 10)
Abbott has a gully, point, cover, mid-off and a third man. First to Klinger, then to Bell, he feeds in a short ball that can be pulled behind square leg. It’s not pretty. Then the last ball of the over he over-corrects the width, doesn’t correct the length, and Bell cuts elegantly but powerfully through backward point, beating the field, to end over that goes for 14. The Scorchers are going at exactly 10 an over, and only need 4.72.
8th over: Perth Scorchers 76-1 (Klinger 34, Bell 1)
Whiteman paddled a four before his dismissal, so the over ends up costing six with a couple of singles. Ian Bell out to the middle – only the seventh overseas player employed by the Scorchers under Justin Langer, say the gentlemen on the TV.
The show comes to an end. Whiteman down the wicket, wallops across the line, and misses. Simple!
7th over: Perth Scorchers 70-0 (Whiteman 37, Klinger 33)
Bird returns, maybe better to get him back on sooner rather than let him stew on that previous over? It doesn’t get much better, as Klinger lashes his first ball over cover for four. Finally a dot ball, as Klinger misses a cut, then a couple more runs on the same stroke behind point. They ease back to singles, only nine from the over, what a change of pace.
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6th over: Perth Scorchers 61-0 (Whiteman 36, Klinger 25)
Lyon bowls his sixth dot ball in a row to Klinger, then his seventh... then the Star Trek alien furrows his weird brow, says “Enough!” and comes down the pitch to clout four over cover. Then down again, even bigger, six down the ground. Now, that one was weird, Klinger hit that so high and it eventually landed on the seat coverings behind the sight screen. And he did a weird little Riverdance move, with one leg up, after he’d struck it. For a second I thought that he thought he’d hit that too high in the air and would be caught. Like an Anger Dance. But maybe it was a celebration? I don’t know.
5th over: Perth Scorchers 50-0 (Whiteman 36, Klinger 14)
Mixing up the bowlers, Abbott comes on. Draws a fluffed shot from Whiteman first ball that skews to the field, then a bottom-edged pull shot for a single. Must be feeling pretty good. Until he drops shot to Klinger who lifts the pull shot over the rope for six more. That was all timing, little power. Over long leg. A few singles, 10 from the over, the Perthians are doing it easily.
4th over: Perth Scorchers 40-0 (Whiteman 34, Klinger 6)
Klinger joins the run-fest as Nathan ‘Nathan’ Lyon comes on and promptly bowls a ball of leg-side puke. Glided for four. Easy does it. But Lyon shakes off the loosener and settles into the spots that he knows he can hit. Teases Klinger a bit, loops a couple, then when Klinger comes down the wicket he finds he hasn’t timed time. Great comeback, five dot balls to at least stem the flow.
3rd over: Perth Scorchers 36-0 (Whiteman 34, Klinger 2)
Dwarshuis. “Rhymes with nauseous,” is a charming way to stay memorable. I’m here to vouch for having an unusual last name. It sucks when you’re a kid, but the pay-off comes in adulthood. Klinger glides a run, happy to get off strike. Whiteman is happy to get on it. he’s happy to get on that delivery too, a full toss that he swivels on, catches up with, and lifts over fine leg for six. He’s beaten by the next ball, but that doesn’t matter when he utterly nails the next off his pads, high over the leg side, and it carries the field of play once more. Thirty-four from 15 balls so far for Whiteman. He’s scoring runs at a 17:1 ratio compared to Klinger.
2nd over: Perth Scorchers 23-0 (Whiteman 22, Klinger 1)
Bird starting to Klinger, who plays to the field and then eases a single to fine leg. Whiteman takes the strike. Gets a decent length delivery and plays an indecent shot for six! That is not fair. The front foot pull, something WA natives tend to choose far more than others. It works at the Waca. That wasn’t short at all, Whiteman almost leaned forward into it, but used his wrists and whipped across the line to lift that flat over the short square boundary. Well. Next ball, fuller, straight down the ground for four. Just evaded mid-off. Bird doesn’t know where to bowl. Shorter again, just a touch, and Whiteman pulls four through backward square. Then produces the proper textbook cover drive for four more! What an over. For the batsman. Nineteen from it. Poor old Jackson.
1st over: Perth Scorchers 4-0 (Whiteman 4, Klinger 0)
Great start from Ben Dwarshuis, pitching the ball up. The first moves through the air in toward the left-handed Whiteman, another crashes into pad. When Dwarshuis pulls the length back, he beats Whiteman outside off twice. In between those deliveries though, he strays too straight and Whiteman puts away the short ball. Five dots, one boundary. Good contest to start with.
So the Sixers have set a target just past 7 per over, with 141 on the board and 9 wickets down, and that should in theory be easy work for the home side. But, this game has a way of getting very full of anxiety very quickly should a couple of wickets fall and the required rate start to climb. Sydney will need to apply that pressure from the get-go, just as Perth did to them.
20th over: Sydney Sixers 141-9 (Lyon 9, Bird 2)
And Pink Sydney’s last pair can’t finish the innings off! They make it to the end, but can’t find a boundary in Tye’s last set of six. Or seven, with a wide in there just sneaking down leg. Singles, a dot ball as Tye goes outside off stump beyond Lyon’s reach, and a predictable mad dash for two from the last ball. But all in all, not the acceleration so desperately needed. Another not-out innings for Jack Bird though, if proud West Australian Rod Marsh is watching at the Waca.
19th over: Sydney Sixers 134-9 (Lyon 6, Bird 0)
Runs and wickets from the over. The ball before Botha is dismissed, he flicks Bresnan for an imperious six off his pads over square leg. Then the ball after, Nathan ‘Nathan’ Lyon glaces a leg-side ball down to the fence for four. Sprinkle a couple of singles in there, and it’s a dozen runs plus two batsmen departing for the over. Busy.
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Richardson’s day isn’t quite done after all. Botha improvising again, down low to try to slog-sweep a seamer away, another top edge and it carries all the way down to long leg.
Stumps scatter. Simple stuff, but hard to do: perfect yorker, maybe shaping a touch, with Dwashuis trying to play that through point. Had to try to score, to be fair to him.
18th over: Sydney Sixers 122-7 (Botha 26, Dwarshuis 9)
Snow White and the Seven Ben Dwarshuis is the new batsman. Gets going well, facing the man of the moment in Richardson and cutting him late behind point for four. Lovely timing. Goes that way again for a single, allowing Botha to pull a couple of runs to fine leg. Must be some pace in this pitch, seems like almost every pull shot today has gone well behind square. Or to hand. A couple more singles, and they need a huge last couple of overs.
Star-making night for Jhye Richardson. 3 poles in a bash final, breaks the back of the Sixers order with speculation over his spot. #BBL06
17th over: Sydney Sixers 113-7 (Botha 23, Dwarshuis 3)
Abbott goes from the first ball. Botha edges four from the second, Tye with some sloppy work to let that ball through on the rope. Botha bunts a single to leg, his new partner pulls a couple, then another one. Eight from the over, so it’s not a disaster.
Never got going, did Sean Abbott, and when Bresnan came back on Abbott tried to go downtown. Cross-batted slog from the first ball of the over, carried down the long-on’s direction, and Agar is one of the best outfielders in the game.
16th over: Sydney Sixers 105-6 (Botha 18, Abbott 5)
Agar the bowler. Botha gets a bottom edge from the first ball through the keeper’s legs, and they scramble a couple of runs. Thereafter, Agar darts in at leg stump or even outside at, at the pads, and they only pick up a couple of singles from the rest of the over. Very tidy bowling at this increasingly late stage of the innings.
15th over: Sydney Sixers 101-6 (Botha 15, Abbott 4)
AJ Tye is back, bowling his full array. Slower ball, cutter, bouncer, yorker. Just the four singles, and the run rate has dipped to 6.7. Pink Sydney need a boost.
14th over: Sydney Sixers 97-6 (Botha 13, Abbott 2)
Botha’s the one playing the Wandering Albatross role now, after a couple of singles. Goes across well outside off stump to Bresnan looking to scoop over fine leg. But Bresnan, whether by good chance or design, bowls what would have been a wide outside the blue line on the off side. But Botha had come across so far that it wasn’t called. There is a wide down leg, and then there’s a boundary as Botha uppercuts fine.
13th over: Sydney Sixers 90-6 (Botha 8, Abbott 1)
Johnson back on. The Scorchers want to finish this now. Botha can’t score from the first, squeezes a single from the second. Abbott is premeditating every shot - he’s expecting a short ball and tries to ramp, but it’s too close to his body. Then he moves off side as Johnson bowls a wide down leg and misses out on glancing it for four. They take a couple of singles, then Abbott is moving way outside his leg stump, wanting to carve through the off side, and the ball is just outside off, so he falls over trying to reach it even though it just misses his wicket. Not great batting. You imagine he’d do better to stand still and hit what comes to him. Johnson wraps up his four overs with 1 for 13. Stellar comeback to high-level cricket from a bowler who at the start of the season wasn’t even sure he wanted to play.
12th over: Sydney Sixers 86-6 (Botha 6, Abbott 0)
It looked like a replay just after Silk’s dismissal, as Botha got a wider ball and slashed it away off the top edge. Can’t quite tell if he got it squarer or if Johnson had moved finer? Either way, this time the shot bounces square of the fieldsmen and skips over for four runs. Botha and Abbott with a big job ahead of them, they’ve both done some fine lower-order batting this season. There’s a wide for a bouncer, then a single. They’re going at 7 per over, still a good enough base for a late launch.
Richardson’s short ball is making this a short game. This one is wider, should really have been put away, but Silk gets more top edge than blade in the attempted cut shot, and this time Johnson at third man finds the ball tracking straight for him.
That’s the main man! So damaging at the end of an innings, as the Brisbane Heat found out two nights ago in the semi-final. But he goes too early today. Richardson again, his second wicket, both halves of that dangerous partnership. Similar mode to Haddin, except Henriques hit the short ball flatter, but got it off the toe. No power, and straight at Klinger’s sternum.
11th over: Sydney Sixers 79-4 (Henriques 21, Silk 3)
Agar back, he’s bowling very straight and not giving them room to get him away. Forces Henriques to defend a couple, and aside from that the batsmen get four singles.
10th over: Sydney Sixers 75-4 (Henriques 19, Silk 1)
Silk gets going with a single through the covers. Haddin had gatheered another boundary before his dismissal, this one uppercut off the face towards third man. Johnson belted around but couldn’t get there to take the catch diving towards it.If you’ve beaten him, you’ve done well.
There it is. You always feel that it could be coming any minute, the wicket of Haddin. Short ball from Richardson, Haddin pulls it at about shoulder height and it limps off the top edge to midwicket. The commentators are speculating that it could be a no-ball for the second bouncer of the over, but Haddin at the boundary line says he has no issue aside from being annoyed at getting out. Would have been a very harsh call if the bowler had been penalised.
9th over: Sydney Sixers 69-3 (Henriques 18, Haddin 34)
Henriques just looking to give Haddin a strike now. Good move too, Moises is the one who needs to bat through and try to be there at the end, where he can really cut loose. Haddin is the sacrifice wicket who can wrest the momentum back if he hasn’t finished doing so already. He goes one step further, any rate, by pulling Tye’s leg-side delivery down through fine leg for four. Easy done. Henriques is nearly run out trying to get a second to keep Haddin on strike, but dives back in at the far end. Tye comes back, finds his yorker range, and they settle for singles thereafter.
8th over: Sydney Sixers 60-3 (Henriques 15, Haddin 28)
I take it back: that was the most sensible, circumspect counter-attacking batting I’ve seen Brad Haddin play. He watched the first four balls of Ashton Agar’s first over of left-arm spin. Read what the bowler was doing, gauged him through the air. Placed a couple of runs to keep the pressure off. Then came down the wicket to both of the last two balls, and smacked them for six. Straight drives both, lofted both (obviously, why would I type that?) but the first one was really just a bunt, and the second one went ten metres higher and twenty longer. I think. I’m not a measuring tape.
7th over: Sydney Sixers 46-3 (Henriques 15, Haddin 14)
Brad Haddin with two runs from nine balls is not the sort of ratio you’re used to hearing about. He doesn’t like it either, so he shuffles at Tim Bresnan’s first ball and thunks it dead straight down the ground for four. Lofted it deliberately, the pick-up drive, clean and classy. Mows a much less classier shot square off the wicket on the leg side and gets a couple after a diving save in the deep, then goes over cover for four more! Lovely. He does enjoy a counter-attack, it’s a great excuse for him to play the way he would have done anyway. A couple of singles top the over off - the Powerplay ends and the runs flow.
6th over: Sydney Sixers 33-3 (Henriques 14, Haddin 2)
Henriques is all about the cross-bat shots today. He nails this one, AJ Tye giving him the right length and Moises pulling it fine. Scrambles another single from an edge into pad, then Haddin is nearly done at short fine leg, not nearly nailing his own attempt at the pull.
5th over: Sydney Sixers 26-3 (Henriques 9, Haddin 1)
Mitch Johnson is once again bowling an absolute gem. He’s bowling to Brad Haddin, a close friend, and the man he shared that key batting partnership with in the first innings for the 2013 Brisbane Ashes Test. Knows his friend’s game pretty well, I’d venture. And proves it by bowling a single-run over to Haddin. One ball so nearly bowls him too, rips off the inside edge into pad and somehow doesn’t squeeze back onto the stumps. Haddin hit straight to the field a couple of times, and there’s a brilliant stop from Johnson off his own bowling to prevent runs down the ground. The final ball is the only fruitful one, Haddin clipping off the pads, in the air, down to long leg for one.
4th over: Sydney Sixers 25-3 (Henriques 9, Haddin 0)
Henriques hits his first six of the day, but it’s certainly by accident. Big pull shot at Richardson, good pace there, top edge, and it carries to one of the causeways that runs under the grandstand, the entrance behind fine third man. A security guard stationed there in the shadow takes the catch and celebrates with enthusiasm. Richardson has his tail up despite the runs. Beats the edge, beats the inside edge into pad, cramps Henriques to cover. Finally the Sixers captain pulls a couple more runs, this time hitting the region square of the wicket where he was aiming.
3rd over: Sydney Sixers 17-3 (Henriques 1)
Crack. That’s how you score off Mitch Johnson. A touch of width, and Lumb hits it so hard that he not only doesn’t think of running, he just turns his back on the bowler as soon as the shot is away. Gets a leg bye after another fast one thunders into his pad, then the run out of Maddinson comes a couple of balls later. Henriques jumps as his first ball comes climbing at his collarbone, but fends it for a run. Then what should be the last ball of the over is a really high bouncer, called wide as a matter of course. Any annoyance Johnson feels is dissolved with the extra ball, as he slings an off-cutter wide and full, but still fast, and Lumb has a massive drive at it. Only gets the nick, and it’s all Mitch once again. 1 for 8 off two.
What a throw from Richardson at third man. Maddinson cuts Johnson behind point, belts back for the second, and puts in the big stretch but not the dive. He’s beaten by the throw, right by the bails giving Whiteman time to backhand off the bails with the batsman right on the line.
2nd over: Sydney Sixers 8-1 (Lumb 1)
Well, he could have been out already this over. A crowd catch from the first ball, then there should have been a run out from the second. Hughes bunts and wants to run, Lumb says no, and the left-hander is stranded as cover throws back to the keeper. But the throw is two metres wide and the stumps can’t be broken in time. Hughes advances to Turner’s off spin and lumps it for six into the crowd straight, trades singles with Lumb, and then drives the last of the over uppishly to mid-off. Caught.
1st over: Sydney Sixers 1-0 (Hughes 1, Lumb 0)
Mitch Johnson. The Western Terror. He went for three runs in four overs in the semi-final, to utterly demolish the Melbourne Stars before they could even think of getting an innings underway. This time it takes a nick to third man from the fifth ball for the opposition to score from him, and that’s it from an over of sharp, fizzing, back-of-a-length stuff that I’m glad someone else is facing.
Sixers
Hughes
Lumb
Henriques*
Maddinson
Silk
Haddin +
Bird
Botha
Lyon
Abbott
Dwarshuis
Scorchers
Whiteman +
Klinger
Bell
Voges*
Cartwright
Turner
Agar
Tye
Bresnan
Johnson
Richardson
Welcome indeed. It’s been a long wait, in summer terms, but it has all come down to this. Hot Pink versus Hot Orange. Tonight, the Waca will look like a packet of angry Kool Fruits has been let loose on the turf. Sydney Sixers women took out the WBBL title earlier today, and now the men’s version of this same match-up will see if there’s the same result.
It’s still about 33 degrees in Perth, down from a high of 38 earlier in the day. They’re playing this game at around 4pm local time so that it tallies up with a 7pm start for eastern Australian television audiences, given most of the population lives there. Which is certainly annoying the more parochial westerners, and isn’t making life easier for the players.
Geoff will be here shortly. In the meantime, check out Ben Raue’s data blog on the advantages of batting second.
Related: The thrill of the chase: why success in the Big Bash is all about batting second
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