Sydney Thunder make embarrassing history in ‘horrific’ scenes in BBL

The Sydney Thunder were bowled out for 15 against the Adelaide Strikers in the BBL. Image: Getty

The Sydney Thunder have scored the lowest total ever recorded in a men’s professional T20 match after being bowled out for just 15 against the Adelaide Strikers on Friday night. In extraordinary scenes that have left the cricket world gobsmacked, the Thunder were bowled out in just 35 balls and finished well short of the previous lowest total in BBL history (57).

The Thunder bowled first and restricted the Strikers to just 9-139 – a very gettable total. However things went horribly wrong for the home side at Showground Stadium as Henry Thornton (5-3) and Wes Agar (4-6) tore through the Sydneysiders.

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Brendan Doggett top-scored for the Thunder with 4, with extras (3) the second top alongside Rilee Rossouw. Five Thunder batters were dismissed without scoring.

“I don’t have much to say about that, to be honest,” Thunder captain Jason Sangha said after their 124-run defeat. “I could sit here and I could dive into what went wrong and what we could have done better. But at the end of the day, it’s just not good enough for a professional team to get bowled out for that little.”

Matt Short took the other wicket for the Strikers, but it was Thornton and Agar who ran riot. The Thunder slumped to 6-9 in the powerplay and only added six more runs.

The 26-year-old Thornton, who had played only eight BBL matches before this season, finished with en economy of 1.06 from three overs – statistically the most efficient spell in BBL history. “I’m still in shock,” Thornton said at stumps. “We just couldn’t believe what was happening.

“I just tried to bowl my best ball. I guess I got really lucky. They nicked them and we just caught everything. I haven’t played many games of cricket that have happened like that and I think if you asked the boys, they’d probably say the same thing. The boys were running the drinks out going, ‘What is going on?’.”

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Adelaide’s strike bowlers Peter Siddle and Rashid Khan didn’t even get a bowl. The Melbourne Renegades held the previous lowest total in BBL history after scoring 57 in 2015.

“Hopefully, we hold onto the record for a while,” Thornton said. “It was an amazing effort. I think everyone’s contributing and that’s the sign of a really good team.

“With the scoring what it was, a really easy way out would have been to go hunting or try and create stuff. If you look at all the dismissals we just hung in and bowled good balls and we got the rewards.”

The scoreboard shows the Sydney Thunder with the lowest score in in T20 history. (Photo by Cameron Spencer/Getty Images)

Eight of the Thunder’s 10 dismissals were caught behind the wicket. However Sangha said he had no concerns about his side’s ability to shrug the defeat off.

“I think it’s pretty easy to move on,” he said. “I know from the outside it looks like we should be having long meetings and talking about how we can change our technique and all this other stuff but at the end of the day, it’s one bad game.

“You’ve got to understand that things aren’t always going to go your way as a batter. On another day, Rossouw’s shot goes a centimetre over Short’s hand for four and maybe we don’t have this conversation and we end up on the winning side.

“You bin this game, you move on. We have another opportunity on Sunday against the Renegades. You’ve just got to keep trusting what went well. We’re a good enough team.”

Chris Lynn and Colin de Grandhomme had earlier forged a 66-run partnership for the only real highlight of the Strikers’ modest total. However it mattered little as the Adelaide bowlers completely destroyed the Thunder.

Cricket fans and commentators were understandably shell-shocked by the extraordinary scenes. While some praised the Strikers’ bowling, others derided the ‘horrific’ batting performance of the Thunder.

with AAP

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