1:38 AM IST, 9:08 PM Local Time: That’s it. The London Spirit emerge victorious at the home of cricket. They hold their nerves and finish on the winning side in front of their home crowd. They beat the Northern Superchargers by 13 runs and jump to the fourth spot in the points table. The Superchargers, meanwhile, suffer their third consecutive loss and need to get to the drawing board quickly.

Adam Lyth and Matthew Short got the Superchargers off to a flying start. They took on the bowling from the word go and were helped by some poor fielding from the Spirit. They scored 45 between them in quick time before Lyth fell on a 14-ball 26 on the last ball of the powerplay. Ravi Bopara was introduced into the attack and he changed the whole complexion of the game.

Bopara with his variations dismissed Short (20), Tom Banton (2) and Saif Zaib (1) in the space of 10 balls. The Spirit were reduced to 56/4 in a blink of an eye. Harry Brook and Adam Hose started building the innings. Both made sure that they found regular boundaries and kept the required run rate under control. The Spirit failed to create further inroads.

Brook and Hose put 62 between them before Bopara broke the partnership in his last set. He dismissed Brook on 44 to help his side get back in the contest. Hose fell on 33 in the penultimate set and some excellent death bowling from Spirit helped them restrict the Superchargers to 147/7 to win the game by 13 runs. Bopara was the standout bowler for Spirit as he registered figures of 4/21 in his 20 balls. Liam Dawson also bowled well and picked up two wickets to help his side defend the total successfully.

Northern Superchargers skipper Wayne Parnell won the toss and elected to bowl first. They bowled well in the powerplay and dismissed Zak Crawley on a run-a-ball 12. Adil Rashid bowled beautifully and cleaned up Daniel Lawrence on four. Adam Rossington took his time to settle in and teed off once he got his eye in. He hit some lusty blows and kept scoring at a brisk rate. He was well-supported by Matthew Wade from the other end.

Rossington brought up his fifty in no time as he kept the Superchargers at bay. Rashid came back in the attack and dismissed Rossington on a 30-ball 53. Wade hit five boundaries and a maximum to score a quickfire 42 before getting dismissed. Daryl Mitchell played a good cameo of 34 off 19 balls at the end to power the London Spirit to 160/6 at the end of their 100 balls. Reece Topley and Adil Rashid bowled brilliantly for the Superchargers as both picked up two wickets each.