Surrey fell to their first defeat of the men’s Vitality Blast as Liam Dawson inspired Hampshire Hawks to victory in Southampton
Dawson retired from red ball cricket earlier this month but jumped into his new life with a thrilling 76 off 44 balls – his seventh T20 fifty and first since a 59 against Sussex Sharks in 2023.
He underpinned the Hawks chase of 175 with stands of 51 with Tom Prest and 83 with Tristan Stubbs to complete the victory with five balls to spare.
Jason Roy gave Surrey a flier, having chosen to bat first, when he and Will Jacks combined to take Chris Wood for a six-fuelled 21 runs in the third over.
But three wickets in four overs started to turn the tide towards the hosts; Scott Currie had Jacks holing out, Wood got his own back on Roy, and 17-year-old Manny Lumsden nicked Ollie Pope off for his first T20 wicket.
Surrey failed to keep the momentum in the batting innings as boundaries became hard to come by.
The one constant through the majority of the innings was Sam Curran smartly rotating the strike and grafting for his team.
Hampshire owned the death overs with just 12 runs coming after the 16th over, with three wickets – including a miraculous Cartwright catch.
All they needed to do to keep Surrey under par was close out the last over…but Jordan Clark had other ideas. Having struck six off the first two balls, he proceeded to nail four sixes in a row over the legside to take Surrey to 174, scoring 30 runs from the final six balls.
Toby Albert smashes two maximums in the second over, but that just started a topsy-turvy powerplay.
Reece Topley and Tom Curran combined for three wickets in as many overs, whipping out James Vince, Joe Weatherley and Albert.
But the Hawks still ended the powerplay ahead of the rate on 62 for three as Dawson’s elevation brought an immediate four-six combo.
Dawson put on 51 with Tom Prest – before he slapped to deep cover – but just carried on seamlessly with Stubbs.
His brutality thumped five sixes on a pitch fluency had been tricky all day, with the last of those maximums taking the Hawks to the winning line, and ended Surrey’s winning start to the campaign.
