David's 68* overshadows Warner's 88* in Hurricanes win

David Warner's unbeaten 66-ball 88 went in vain as Hobart Hurricanes cruised to a comfortable 6-wicket win over Sydney Thunder to register their fifth win of the season and take a two-point lead at the top of the points table. Led by Tim David's blazing unbeaten 38-ball 68, which helped them overhaul the total of 164 for 6 with 19 balls to spare.

Hurricanes had made a quick start to the chase. After being dropped off the second ball of the innings, Mitchell Owen smashed Mohammad Hasnain for a boundary and a six. Matthew Wade then took the attack to George Garton in the next over, for a couple of sixes. Both the openers departed in quick succession, but Charlie Wakim and Nikhil Chaudhary steadied the innings briefly. Tom Andrews cleaned up Wakim at the start of the seventh over to keep the game in balance, but Thunder struggled to hold the momentum from thereon.

David took some time to settle in, but then smashed Dan Christian for a boundary and a six to end the 10th over. Even as Chaudhary fell to Garton a couple of overs later, David ensured that Thunder couldn't find a way back into the contest. He smashed two boundaries and a six in an over by Wes Agar and then picked 21 more from Hasnain's next over. He took Hurricanes over the line by hitting Agar over the deep mid wicket fence, the second six of the over.

Earlier in the day, Warner single-handedly controlled Thunder's innings. Hurricanes kept chipping away with regular wickets and the Thunder batters struggled to find the momentum either. Warner himself struggled early on, moving at run-a-ball for the first 20 deliveries that he faced before crunching Peter Htzoglou for a boundary through cover. In fact for the first 48 deliveries of his innings, he had managed to pick only 52 runs, unable to counter the slower balls and the length deliveries.

Sam Billings was the only one who offered some push to Thunder's innings, hitting four boundaries in his 15-ball 28. Warner found a late acceleration and picked some useful runs in the death overs against Chris Jordan and Nathan Ellis.

Brief Scores: Sydney Thunder 164/6 in 20 overs (David Warner 88*, Sam Billings 28; Ridley Meredith 2-30) lost to Hobart Hurricanes 165/4 in 16.5 overs (Tim David 68*, Nkhil Chaudhary 29; George Garton 2-31) by 6 wickets.