Report: South East Stars v Sparks, Charlotte Edwards Cup

Emily Arlott took a hat-trick and then hit the winning runs as the Central Sparks beat the South East Stars by three wickets in a Charlotte Edwards Cup thriller at Canterbury.

Arlott took four for 21 and Katie George two for 31 as the Stars were limited to 122 for eight, Sophia Dunkley, the top scorer with 58 from 49 balls.

16-year-old spinner Tilly Corteen-Coleman then took three for 14 the Stars, but Sparks skipper Eve Jones looked to have taken the game away from the Stars with a crucial stand of 59 with Courtney Webb.

Two late wickets from Ryana MacDonald-Gay left the Sparks needing eight from the last over, but Arlott hit Tash Farrant’s first two balls for fours to seal the win with four balls to spare, the Sparks finishing on 123 for seven.

It was a poignant occasion for a crowd of 1,277, with six Kent-raised players representing the Stars in their final scheduled appearance at the Spitfire Ground.

The hosts chose to bat but struggled to score early on and collapsed late in the innings when five wickets fell for four runs in the space of nine balls.

Bryony Smith was run out for seven, when Katie George deflected a violent drive from Sophia Dunkley on to the stumps at the non-strikers end.

Paige Scholfield had made a run-a-ball 27 when she tried to pull Charis Pavely and was brilliantly caught by a forward diving George at deep-midwicket.

Dunkley, who might have been run out for four, played the anchor role, pulling Arlott through cow corner to reach her 50 and bring up the Stars 100 in the 16^th over.

It was 107 for two at the end of the 17^th, but Arlott’s treble dashed any hopes of a surge in the death overs. Dunkley was caught at mid-off by Courtney Webb, Tash Farrant snared by Eve Jones at mid-on and she completed the hat-trick when she bowled Ryana McDonald-Gay.

George then twisted the knife with two wickets in as many balls, bowling Phoebe Franklin for 12 and then bowling Chloe Hill for a golden duck. 

Arlott claimed her fourth wicket when she had Alexa Stonehouse caught for three by Davina Perrin off the final ball of the innings.

The target looked low, but 16-year-old Tilly Corteen-Coleman, playing at the ground next door to the hospital she was born in, removed both openers in the third over, bowling Perrin for one and Abigail Baker middle stump for 12 four balls later.

Farrant removed Abbey Freeborn for three, caught by Corteen-Coleman and George was stumped by Chloe Hill off Kalea Moore for six, when she mistakenly thought the keeper hadn’t gathered the ball and charged down the wicket.

At 41 for four the Stars were well in the game, but Jones was dropped on 17 and with the run rate never rising above eight she and Webb were able to play cautiously.

Corteen-Coleman revived the Stars when she bowled Webb for 31 and although her final delivery, to Jones was dropped by Stonehouse, the batter went at the start of the 19^th, caught by Scholfield off MacDonald-Gay for 43. When MacDonald-Gay then bowled Pavely for a duck the Sparks were left needing eight off the final over, but Arlott drove Farrant’s first ball for four and then brilliantly scooped the second over Hill’s head to clinch the victory and finish on 19 not out.

Central Sparks Emily Arlott said: “I think at the start of the day if you said I was going to take a hat-trick or hitting the winning runs I’d have been quite happy. It’s obviously nice to finish the complete game and get a win on the board because a hat-trick wouldn’t have meant much if we’d lost.

“I’ll admit the first one to Dunks was an off-cutter and that’s not my favourite ball but I just thought I’d try it and it actually paid off, which was nice. The second one to Tash I went with a wide yorker and when it’s your day they just go to hand. On another day it could have gone for four. For the third one I kept the stumps (in play) and just tried to keep it straight as possible.

“When you look at their batting line-up, they are a bit of a joke of a team at times so at the start of the day I think if we’d held them back for even 40 more than that I think we would have still been happy.

“So we were really happy and we then took that momentum into the batting innings. Webby did a really good job and it would have looked a really different game if we’d had another 30 or40 to get, that probably would have killed it, but they were amazing in the middle. For someone like me whose job is just to blaze it, you can’t do that without having the foundations.

“Me and G in the middle know each other’s games really well and at that point I felt it was on me to get us over the line so I said to her it just had to be four. It was going to probably be quite a high-risk shot and ended up being my favourite kind of shot down the ground. Luck falls in your favour when it’s your day and I’m really happy.”