In a crunch game, the Paarl Rocks bowlers produced a near-perfect performance to hand the Nelson Mandela Bay Giants their first loss of the tournament.
Imran Tahir, again, produced a special performance in front of the home crowd. His efforts reduced the Paarl Rocks to an average T20 score at St Georges Stadium.
The veteran spinner finished with figures of 2/19 in 4 overs, with the wickets of Cameron Delport and Mangaliso Mosehle to his name.
Faf du Plessis (27 off 21 balls) looked very comfortable upfront, finding boundaries at ease before a moment of brilliance from Onke Nyaku and Jon-Jon Smuts saw the visiting captain run-out at the non- striker’s end.
Chasing a target of 167, Jason Roy missed a straight one which crashed into the stumps in the first ball of the run-chase, Bjorn Fortuin the bowler.
The left-arm orthodox bowler seems to be enjoying his time in the powerplay. His wicket-to-wicket approach with his occasional change of pace here makes it tough for batters to score off him.
The Lions and Paarl Rocks spinner returned figures 2/28 in four overs.
Hardus Viljoen, Tabraiz Shamsi, Ferisco Adams and Isuru Udana all chipped in with two wickets each and all went under 8 runs an over which handed the Rocks a 31-run win.
The Giants dropped to second place trailing Paarl Rocks on Net Run-Rate while both teams are level on 19 points after six matches.
Photo: Deryck Foster/BackpagePix
