Undefeated Washington Freedom secures top 2 finish

Washington Freedom comfortably defeated Texas Super Kings by 42 runs. Freedom captain Steve Smith opted to bat first on a used pitch, with both teams bringing in a spinner as expected. Travis Head (53), who came into the game with two half-centuries, continued his merry form with another fifty. He was enamoured with Zia-ul-Haq and Marcus Stoinis in the third and fourth overs, hitting them for 15 and 22 runs respectively. He reached his fifty from just 20 balls. Freedom managed to make fifty in four overs, forcing Super Kings captain Faf du Plessis to bring in Noor Ahmad. He struck gold straight away, dismissing Head who was induced by a tossed delivery, the slog sweep resulting in a simple catch at deep midwicket.

The Super Kings took two wickets in the next two overs with Andries Gous caught in front by Dwayne Bravo from a full delivery while Rachin Ravindra was caught by Noor from his own bowling. With wickets falling regularly, Glenn Maxwell and Smith rotated the strike for a couple of overs with the odd boundary providing a strong finish.

Maxwell was castled by Noor, resulting in Obus Pienaar coming in and making a flashy cameo of 33 from 21 deliveries. Smith played the perfect anchor through the carnage at the other end, bringing up his fifty in the 18th over. Pienaar closed the innings with two maximums off Stoinis in the final over to take the Freedom past the 200-run mark.

In response, the Super Kings looked to be aggressive in the Powerplay as well, with batters Devon Conway and Faf du Plessis performing well. The two batted out the first two overs and took 15 runs off Jansen in the third. The move to bring in Maxwell in the fourth over worked wonders for Freedom, who had Conway in front of them straight away. With an asking rate of over 10 from the start, du Plessis took over from Amila Aponso by hitting three sixes and a four with 22 from the over. Super Kings had raced to 76-1 in the Powerplay. du Plessis made his fifty off just 19 balls in the 7th over.

Freedom managed to get things back on track with some quiet overs, while also removing Aaron Hardie who was rushed on the pull and Joshua Tromp who was sent to long-off by the pressure. Jasdeep Singh who was called in to replace Saurabh Netravalkar as he was on paternity leave, got the big fish from Faf du Plessis, fooled by a slower ball outside off which was driven straight to long-off.

Things got worse after Milind Kumar, Marcus Stoinis and Dwayne Bravo were dismissed cheaply. Jasdeep Singh was among the pick-offs of the bowlers with 3 for 25 in his 4 overs. Calvin Savage (35) did his best for TSK to take it deep but was left without partners at the other end. Rachin Ravindra came back in the last over to take two wickets, four for the day for him and seal a convincing 42-run win for his team.

Short scores: Washington Freedom 206/5 in 20 overs (Steven Smith 57, Travis Head 53; Noor Ahmad 3-38, Dwayne Bravo 2-40) defeated Texas Super Kings 164-10 in 19.5 overs (Faf du Plessis 55, Calvin Savage 35; Rachin Ravindra 4-16, Jasdeep Singh 3-25) with 42 runs