Nqabayomzi Peter of Paarl Royals sends down a delivery against Pretoria Capitals. Sportzpics
The Paarl Royals continue to enjoy their time out in the winelands as they hand another blow to the Pretoria Capital’s season with an eleven-run win in their SA20 clash at Boland Park in Paarl on Saturday.
The win strengthened the Cape side's position at the top of the log with 24 points from their seven matches, while the Capitals remain second from the bottom on nine points from as many matches.
Needing 141 runs to win, the Capitals were in early trouble as they ended the powerplay on 23/3 with all of Rahmanullah Gurbaz (6), Marquez Ackerman (2) and Rilee Rossouw (4) dismissed cheaply.
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Standing between them and their second win of the season would be how they navigate the spin test for the rest of their chase.
The Royals made use of their spinners throughout the contest as all 20 overs were shared between the slow bowlers.
A 77-run partnership between Will Jacks (56 off 53, 2x4, 2x6) and Kyle Verreynne (30 off 33 balls) stalled the home side's momentum and got the visitors chase back on track.
The platform was laid and with only 30 runs required off the last two overs, the Capitals had already lost Verreynne and they needed Jacks to face as many balls as possible.
Hiowever, he could only face one ball in the penultimate over, which only went for two runs and what was a hard task became impossible as the Royals notched up their sixth win of the season.
The message coming in to the contest from Jonathan Trott was that the team needed to perform, and not only that but they needed to perform to win their remaining games.
Their inconsistent start to the season has seen them lose ground to teams in the top half.
Rossouw won the toss and fielded first under the clear blue skies with Boland's faithful cheering from the stands in confidence with their table-topping side looking to solidify their position at the top.
For the Capitals, delivering the required performance couldn’t have gotten off to a better start.
As tournament’s leading run-scorer Lhuan-dre Pretorius fell cheaply without adding to his 258 runs scored in the tournament so far.
Rubin Hermann (9) didn’t last long and as Joe Root attempted to keep the scoreboard ticking, his attempted pull shot off Jason Behrendorff found the dependable James Neesham on the fence.
For a few seconds, Paarl fell to 23/3 until Neesham, in completing his catch, lost control of the ball and handed Root another life.
The experienced batter cashed in as he scored his second half-century of the tournament and took over from his opening partner as the leading run scorer (279) in the competition.
On a wicket that required a lot of grind and application, the English international once again showcased his class with an innings that propelled the home side to a defendable score of 140/4 in their allotted 20 overs.
Root (78 off 56, 8x4, 2x6 ) had a healthy strike rate of close to 140, and the sixth-wicket partnership of 59 with skipper David Miller (29 off 18) handed the Capitals a tricky task to get their season back on track.
To get to their target, they needed to get through the spin-heavy attack of the Cape side but it wasn’t to be as they fell just eleven runs short of the target, falling to their fourth loss of the season.
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