Amir and Hasaranga star as Vipers sting Warriorz to remain on top

Mohammad Abdullah, Senior Sports Reporter

 Mohammad Amir bowled a mesmerising spell to help Desert Vipers set up a 10-wicket victory against Sharjah Warriorz in their ILT20 match in Dubai.

Amir and Wanindu Hasaranga shared seven wickets between them as Vipers bounced back with a bang to rout Warriorz and maintain their stranglehold on the top spot with the fifth win from six games.

Vipers thwarted Warriors for a paltry total of 91 and chased down the target with 10 overs to spare. Fakhar Zaman smashed a blitzkrieg fifty to lead the chase.

He added 95 runs for an unbeaten first-wicket partnership with Alex Hales, who remained not out on 23 as Vipers vented their anger at the defeat against Dubai Capital in the last match.

Fakhar made light work of the modest target and smacked the Warriorz bowlers on his will. He raced to his fifty in just 30 deliveries. Fakhar’s innings of 71 runs off 39 balls was studded with seven boundaries and four hits over it.

Earlier, Vipers’ bowlers Amir and Hasaranga wreaked havoc as they ripped through the Warriors’ batting line-up. Warriorz could not wage a war and there was an abject surrender by their batsmen against Vipers bowlers.

Amir looked like a shadow of his former self. Pakistan’s former pace spearhead led the charge from the front as he triggered the collapse.

Amir began the skid with the dismissal of Johnson Charles by getting him caught by Lawerence as Vipers lost their first wicket with just five runs on the board.

Avishka Fernando was the next man to go as he sliced a sitter to an agile Hales at point while trying to work the ball away for a four. Amir picked up his second, pushing Warriors on the backfoot with a double strike within a span of two deliveries.

In his next over, Amir returned to heap more misery on the reeling Warriorz. He got rid of the UAE batsman Rohan Mustafa to make it 15/3. With three batsmen back in the pavilion in just the third over of the match, Warriors were left facing an early end to the innings.

They needed someone to play a sheet-anchor role and put the faltering innings back on the track. David Payne added to their woes as he got rid of opener Tom Kohler-Cadmore.

Dismissal of Kohler-Cadmore dented the morale of the Warriorz batting line-up, which was already stuttering.

They collapsed like a pack of cards. Kohler-Cadmore, who is the star batsman of Warriorz, was early on his shot as the ball took the leading edge and landed in the safe hands of Hales at the mid-wicket.

Warriors’ batsmen failed to apply themselves and could not put any kind of resistance against a charged-up bowling attack of the Vipers.

But the worst was still to come as Sri Lankan spinner Hasaranga was lurking in his den to pound on his prey. He accounted for the dismissals of Tim Seifert, Luke Wells and Ashton Agar.

Hasaranga trapped Seifert in front of the stumps as Warriors lost the sixth wicket for 43 runs. Two balls later, Hasaranga got Agar stumped. He pitched the ball just short of good length, inviting the batsman to play on the front foot.

Agar stretched his front foot to the maximum as his back foot left the ground yet he failed to reach the pitch of the ball and an alert Suri dislodged the bails to give Hasaranga his third scalp, second in the same over.

Warriorz needed a partnership and their batsmen failed to convert their starts into big scores. Top five batsmen could not breach the two-digit mark. They were not getting the partnerships going and were facing the probability of getting out for the lowest ever ILT20 score.

Meanwhile, Jason Roy of England put up a brave front as he led the fightback single-handedly with a gritty unbeaten 34-ball 30 to save Warriorz blushes of being all out for the lowest total in the history of the tournament.

He shared a couple of vital partnerships with Harmeet Singh and Tim Southee to take the scores to 91 before Amir returned to complete his unfinished business. Curran also took two wickets to return with a figure of 2/14 while Amir wrapped up the innings with the dismissal of Adam Milne, completing his four-wicket haul.