Natwest T20 Blast: Hampshire 189-8 beat Middlesex 160-7 by 29 runs

Michael Carberry continued a good day for the over-35s by hitting his highest T20 Blast score for three years – exactly a year after his cancer diagnosis.

The 36 year-old followed another superlative Wimbledon performance from 35 year-old Roger Federer with a 45-ball 77, his highest T20 score in any competition since the 2014/15 Big Bash, as Hampshire maintained their 100 per cent record in this season’s Natwest T20 Blast.

There were more than 9,000 packed into the Ageas Bowl last night and the atmosphere helped propel Carberry towards the sort of form that earned him England recognition not so long ago.

Captain James Vince set the tempo with a blistering 34 (15 balls), 30 of which came in beautifully orthodox boundaries (six fours, one six).

Carberry and Rileee Rossouw continued to decimate the visitors’ attack, putting on 58 in six overs.

Umpire Nigel Cowley was upended by one of Carberry’s four fours and the first of his five sixes hit a window on the first floor of the pavilion.

Aussie leg-spinner Nathan Sowter was on the receiving end of Carberry’s first two maximums and Tom Helm, who took 3-29 against Surrey at Lord’s the night before, conceded two in as many balls - the second of which was flat batted like a Federer backhand - in conceding 21 off the 15th.

Carberry was finally bowled in the final over immediately after driving James Franklin for his fifth six over the man on the extra-cover boundary.

Franklin took three wickets from the last four balls to keep Hampshire below 190.

But the home side were outstanding in the field.

Carberry continued a memorable night with a stunning catch at deep point to get rid of Paul Stirling.

Rossouw bettered that with a high one-handed catch in the covers when McCullum seemed to have fired the ball past him.

England captain Eoin Morgan chipped former Middlesex man Gareth Berg for six but in the same over the former Middlesex man took a return catch off Dawid Malan.

Then Bailey ran out Franklin with a direct hit as the visitors limped to 41-4 at the end of the powerplay (Hampshire were 58-1 from their first six overs).

With the visitors floundering, the stage was set for Mason Crane.

Hampshire’s leg-spin prodigy finished with 4-0-15-3 to reduce Middlesex to 74-7 and effectively end the match as a contest.

He had the scalp of his England captain when Morgan drove to long-off and that man Carberry ran in 30 yards from the cover boundary to take a sliding catch that accounted for Ryan Higgins.

After Toby Roland-Jones was beaten in the flight and stumped, John Simpson and Tim Southee restored pride with an unbroken eighth-wicket stand of 86 from 45 balls.