Tye, Turner help Scorchers to a winning start

This was Tye's third hat-trick in T20 cricket. © Getty

Led by Ashton Turner's half century and Andrew Tye's four-fer, including his third T20 hat-trick, Perth Scorchers began their BBL campaign with a comfortable winagainst Sydney Sixers at the SCG on Saturday (December 23).

Put into bat, Sixers began well as far as scoring was concerned, but lost the top four within the powerplay overs. Jhey Richardson's pace undid the openers - Daniel Hughes and Jason Roy - as they were late into their shots.

Nic Maddinson played virtually a lone hand in the middle overs as the Scorchers pacers kept chipping in with wickets. Andrew Tye and David Willey accounted for the three wickets that followed.

Maddinson combined with Peter Nevill for a brief period of consolidation with a 37-run stand, but the slow nature of the partnership also brought the scoring rate considerably down, close to run-a-ball. Maddinson even got a life when his uppish drive off Mitchell Johnson was dropped by the mid off fielder. However, he couldn't make most of it as he pulled the next ball straight down the throat of Andrew Tye at deep fine leg.

Nevill departed two balls later, but a 28-ball 48-run stand for the eighth wicket by Steve O'Keefe and Sean Abbott helped Sixers make a recovery, but their innings soon folded up with Tye bagging his second BBL hat-trick to wrap up the opposition for only 132. O'Keefe and Abbott top edged their swipes to fielders at deep square leg and cover point respectively, while last Daniel Sams was trapped leg-before-wicket.

There was little difficulty in the chase for Scorchers even as they lost the openers in quick succession after a slow start. With a small target to chase, the visitors began steady, but were dismissed pulling off successive deliveries in the fifth over off Sean Abbott.

None of the other bowlers caused much trouble and with Abbott's two overs being held back till the death, they kept pegging away at the target. When Hilton Cartright and David Willey were slowly building a steady partnership, Abbott was brought back into the attack and succeeded yet again. Willey, promoted as a pinch hitter, couldn't hold back on his pull shot and holed out to Maddinson at deep fine leg.

Thereafter, it was an easy cruise for the defending champions. The only blip in the chase from thereon was the departure of Cartright, who gave a return catch to Doug Bollinger. Even as they were scoring at less than run-a-ball, with the scoreboard reading 66 for 4 in 11.5 overs, the low target helped Scorchers to go about their chase without much panic.

O'Keefe and Johan Botha bowled some tight overs in the middle period, conceding only 41 from their combined eight overs, but couldn't take wickets. Abbott, who had bagged three of the four wickets to fall in the innings, in his first two overs, was held back for way too long. By the time, he came on to bowl his third over, the required equation had reduced to 30 runs from 24 balls with two set batsmen at the crease. The target was eventually chased down with 11 balls to spare.

Turner slammed five sixes and pounded two boundaries en route his 27-ball 52. The six-wicket defeat has left Sixers without a win in two games so far this season.

Brief Scores: Sydney Sixers 132 in 18.4 overs (Nic Maddinson 31, Sean Abbott 23; Andrew Tye 4-21, Mitchell Johnson 2-27) lost to Perth Scorchers 136/4 in 18.1 overs (Ashton Turner 52*, William Bosisto 21; Sean Abbott 3-28, Doug Bollinger 1-30) by six wickets