Courtesy: Cricket Australia
On Saturday, November 16, Spencer Johnson picked up his maiden five-wicket haul in T20I cricket for Australia during the second match of the series against Pakistan at the Sydney Cricket Ground (SCG). With his incredible spell, Australia managed to successfully defend the 147-run total, bundling out Pakistan for 134 runs in the final over of the innings, to win the contest by 14 runs, which also meant that the hosts sealed the three-match series 2-0 with one game remaining.
For the unversed, Australia were restricted to 147/9 in their allotted 20 overs as Haris Rauf and Abbas Afridi shared seven wickets among themselves, while Matthew Short top-scored for the hosts with his 32 off 17. In the run chase, Pakistan lost early wickets in the power play stage with Spencer Johnson sending Sahibzada Farhan back into the pavilion for 5 off 10, who was trying to take the attack to the left-arm fast bowler, but he could only hit the short ball to the fielder at the mid-wicket region.
Spencer Johnson registered figures of 5/26 in his four-over spell vs Pakistan
In the third over of his spell, Spencer Johnson took the massive wicket of Pakistan captain Mohammad Rizwan, who could only score 16 off 26, and on the very next ball, he nicked off vice-captain Salman Ali Agha for a golden duck, to find himself on a hat-trick. Although he couldn’t pick up three wickets in three balls, the 28-year-old came back into the attack for his final over at the death, to extinguish the final hope of Pakistan.
Spencer Johnson got the better of the half-centurion Usman Khan (52 off 38) on a shorter length delivery, and just two balls later, Abbas Afridi could only spoon yet another short one from him into the leg side for an Australian fielder to take a simple catch. The Adelaide-born cricketer ended up with figures of 5/26 in his four-over spell despite being taken for runs in the opening over of the Pakistan innings.
