Gloucestershire win the Vitality Blast 2024!
14 September 2024
By Jon Culley
Vitality Blast, Final - Edgbaston, Birmingham
Somerset v Gloucestershire - Saturday, September 14, 2024
Gloucestershire are Vitality Blast champions after their late season surge took them all the way to the first T20 title in the club’s history with a stunning eight-wicket victory over holders Somerset in the final at Edgbaston.
Jack Taylor’s team followed their eight-wicket semi-final defeat of Sussex with another superbly professional performance against their west country rivals, who were strong favourites after beating Surrey in the other semi-final but were soundly beaten with 30 balls to spare.
Miles Hammond (58 not out from 41 balls, three sixes) and Cameron Bancroft (53 from 42, two sixes), prolific partners at the top of the innings this season, shared their second hundred-plus stand of the campaign, putting on 112 before they were parted as Gloucestershire chased a modest target of 125 on a slow pitch that had yielded runs at a miserly rate for most of the day.
Matt Taylor (3-19) and David Payne (3-27), who have shared 61 Blast wickets this season, were again Gloucestershire’s biggest weapons with the ball as they showed themselves masters of the conditions, the county lifting their first silverware for nine years.
Taylor snared his three in the powerplay, Payne inflicting damage at the end of the innings. Only skipper Lewis Gregory’s half-century kept Somerset in the game as they were bowled out for 124 in 19.4 overs.
Gloucestershire were the outsiders on the day, having qualified for the knock-out stages only on net run-rate after winning their last two South Group games, before upsetting Birmingham Bears on this ground in the quarter-finals.
Their last trophy success came in 2015 in the One-Day Cup, which Somerset will hope to win in next weekend’s final after seeing their hopes of landing a treble come to an end.
Gloucestershire skipper Jack Taylor’s decision to bowl first was rewarded handsomely by younger brother Matt as the left-arm seamer matched his three-wicket semi-final haul in the space of two overs as the favourites wobbled at 41 for three in the powerplay.
Tom Kohler-Cadmore had lifted Gloucestershire’s bowling talisman David Payne for two sixes in four balls but after Will Smeed had sliced to short third, a slower ball in the same over induced a miscue that had Kohler-Cadmore well taken at deep cover.
The last ball of Taylor’s second over saw James Rew, was brilliantly held by Cameron Bancroft at extra cover and when off-spinner Ollie Price then bowled Sean Dickson first ball attempting a reverse hit, Somerset had lost both their semi-final heroes at 42 for four.
Tom Abell and Lewis Gregory added 44 but boundaries did not come easily and their progress was halted when Abell picked out the fielder at long-on. Gregory timed a couple of super straight sixes but the return of Payne to the attack delivered another jolt as back-to-back slower balls saw Ben Green skew to backward point and Craig Overton spoon to extra cover.
A one-handed diving catch by James Bracey accounted for Roelof van der Merwe. Gregory held things together manfully but, having been dropped on 51, he fell two runs later, hitting Payne straight to long-off, and Josh Shaw claimed Jake Ball as the final wicket via a catch at mid-off as Somerset were dismissed in 19.4 overs.
By contrast with Somerset’s, Gloucestershire’s batting powerplay was near-flawless as Hammond and Bancroft put 49 unanswered runs on the board. The latter started things moving with sixes driven and ramped off Overton and Josh Davey respectively before Hammond closed the sixth over with consecutive extra cover boundaries off Gregory.
After Hammond had despatched Ball for six with a beautiful leg-side pick-up, an eventful 10th over saw Bancroft overturn Green’s lbw on review before almost being run out scrambling back as a ball on the toe left Hammond unable to leave his crease but the over ended with all wickets intact as before at 82 without loss, needing just 43 more.
Bancroft finally departed in the 14th over, pulling Davey to Sneed on the square-leg rope, and James Bracey was caught at mid-off off Jake Ball, before Ollie Price delivered the final blow, hammering Ball for six over long-off to spark ecstatic celebrations among his team-mates, who streamed on to the field to revel in the moment.
