MI Emirates' dramatically collapse to hand Vipers victory

The Desert Vipers continued their scintillating start to the ILT20 with their fourth successive win in as many games. After ekeing out a Super Over win in their last game, they beat the MI Emirates by one run in another nail-biting contest. David Payne's four-fer which included three in the 19th over of the chase helped the Vipers restrict MIE to 158 for 9 who were in pursuit of 160.

MIE needed only 17 to get off two overs with Kieron Pollard and Romario Shepherd at the crease, and five wickets to spare. Payne got the latter to hold out to deep mid-wicket before getting the set Pollard (23 off 12) to pull straight to deep mid-wicket's throat. He rounded off the over with Chris Woakes' middle-stump pegged back to pick three in the over and concede just a run. With still 16 to get, Khuzaima Tanveer brought the equation down to 12 off 3 before Rashid Khan hit a six and a four to get it down to 2 off 1. But Vriitya Aravind caught AM Ghazanfar short off the crease on the last ball to inflict a famous win.

Earlier, in the chase Jonny Bairstow holed out to deep backward square-leg immediately after flicking Tanveer in the same region for six. Muhammad Waseem and Tom Banton hit Payne for three fours together while they hit two more boundaries off Sam Curran, and then rounded off the PowerPlay on 49 for 1. Tanveer broke the 42-run stand with the wicket of Waseem while Noor Ahmad and Lockie Ferguson began to apply the brakes on the scoring. Pooran hit a couple of boundaries and began to set in but was caught by Shimron Hetmyer, three balls after being dropped by him, for 31. The Vipers roared back into the contest in the next over as Payne picked up Banton.

With 55 needed off the last five overs, Tajinder Dhillon whacked two sixes in a 20-run over off Curran while Pollard pounced on Noor in an 11-run 17th over. Ferguson ended his economical spell off 4-0-23-1 with the wicket off Dhillon (17 off 7) before the hara-kiri took place for MIE.

While setting the total, Fakhar Zaman was dropped by Waseem on zero while Andries Gous continued his good starts with two boundaries in the second over. The duo found the boundaries regularly before Gous pulled up in the fifth over and had to retire hurt as Max Holden came out to bat. The Vipers still managed to see out the PowerPlay wicketless at 51 for 0.

Holden and Zaman put on 51 runs together in 37 balls before Ghazanfar got him to mistime one to long-on. The Vipers brought up the 100 in the 14th over with the MIE bowlers tightening the screws and not conceding boundaries for a lengthy spell of time. Holden broke the shackles in the 15th over off Shepherd to score the first boundary in 36 balls.

With Holden struggling to time the ball, he retired out on 42 as Hetmyer walked to the crease and smashed 15 off 9 balls. Curran and Lawrence hit a six and a four respectively to take the Vipers to 159 for 4 in their allotted overs.

Brief Scores: Desert Vipers 159 for 4 in 20 overs (Max Holden 42, Fakhar Zaman 35; AM Ghazanfar 2-32, Fazalhaq Farooqi 1-27) beat MI Emirates 158 for 9 in 20 overs (Tom Banton 34, Nicholas Pooran 31; David Payne 4-29, Khuzaima Tanveer 2-34) by 1 run