Nottinghamshire 58 for 0 against Durham; game abandoned
With just five overs remaining at Trent Bridge, the Notts Outlaws’ North Group match against Durham was called off due to torrential rain, which destroyed any hope of the team securing their first victory of the season on Friday.
The original start time of 2.30 pm was pushed out to 4 pm due to early rain, with a 17-over match planned for each side.
After losing the toss and choosing to bowl first, Durham openers Alex Lees and Graham Clark made a quick start, scoring 58 runs, of which 28 came from England pacer Olly Stone’s two overs. Outlaws captain Joe Clarke won the toss and opted to bowl first.
Before hitting a massive six into the Fox Round stand, Clark hit two boundaries in Stone’s opening over and two more in his second.
Left-armer from New Zealand Ben Lister saw the Durham innings through to its fifth over, which is the bare minimum that both teams have to face to be in a match, but rain, thunder, and lightning returned with a vengeance.
Despite the storm’s brief duration of only fifteen minutes, umpires Paul Baldwin and James Middlebrook were forced to cancel the game because of the excessive amount of water that was dumped on the field, which was ironically happening during the day’s brightest part of the sky.
The Outlaws grab another point for a no-result. On Friday night, they broke their duck for the season against Worcestershire by exceeding their DLS goal by one run in another rain-affected game.
The Outlaws appeared to have little chance of making it to the knockout stages, sitting at the bottom of the table with just three points at the midway point. Even yet, an impressive run of victories in the second half of the season might still see them advance in an open group where all teams, including the leaders Lancashire Lightning, have fewer than six points.
Durham is in the same situation, coming in third from the bottom with five points, just one point below Yorkshire Vikings in second position.