T20 Blast: Tom Banton makes up for his dismal batting with a terrific work behind wickets

Somerset rubbed shoulders with Lancashire in the 3^rd quarter-finals of the T20 Blast that took place in Taunton on August 26. Somerset’s opener Tom Banton has been struggling with a rough with the bat in hand and failed to get runs under his belt throughout the English summer. However, in the same match, he made up for it with his terrific gloves work.

Banton could just manage only one run from his bat against Lancashire but remained upright behind the wickets while Lancashire posted the total. He sent back Josh Bohannon who looked settled on 35 runs. As Van der Merwe came up with his delivery, Banton collected the ball in no time from the air and took the bails off in a blink of an eye.

Though Banton could produce only one run while opening the order for Somerset, they won the match by seven wickets to progress to Finals Day. Banton’s struggle to gather runs prevailed in The Hundred too as he plied his trade for Welsh Fire.

Here is an outstanding effort from Tom Banton behind the wickets

Rate these @TBanton18 reactions out of 10 👀#Blast21 pic.twitter.com/7UgiWrpDRl

— Vitality Blast (@VitalityBlast) August 26, 2021

Talking about the match that took place in Taunton, Somerset invited Lancashire to take the field with willows first. They posted 184 runs in their quota of 20 overs which came on back of Dane Vila’s 42 and Rob Jones’ 38 runs. Other vital runs came from the bat of Bhannon’s bat only. Roelof van der Merwe picked four wickets for his team and looked a clean contender of player of the match until victory fell in Somerset’s favour and Tom Abell played a stunning unbeaten knock of 78 runs.

Tom Abell’s late 78 of 45 helps Somerset get over the line

Abell’s knock further pushed Somerset to get the match in their favour as they won by seven wickets and 11 balls remaining in the game. Abell took hold of the team when they were down on 12/2. Will Smeed and Tom Lammonby supported Abell well enough as they pitched in with knocks of 44 and 47 runs respectively. Danny Lamb picked two wickets for his team while Tom Bailey got one scalp to his credit.