Surrey vs Yorkshire Vikings Vitality Blast Quarter-Final Preview

Wednesday evening will see the first quarter-final in this seasons Vitality Blast, when Surrey will be facing Yorkshire Vikings at the Kia Oval.

The inaugural winners of the competition Surrey are up against a side that have never won the competition before.

Both sides will b e without their captains, Chris Jordan of Surrey and David Willey of Yorkshire because of the forthcoming England T20I series against India.

A clash between two teams decimated by England call ups will see Surrey be without Sam Curran, Jason Roy and Reece Topley and Yorkshire without Harry Brook and Dawid Malan.

There is a chance that possibly Test players Ben Foakes, Ollie Pope, Jonny Bairstow and Joe Root could return in tomorrow night’s encounter. If so, a big Kia Oval crowd will welcome the chance to see the likes of Root and Bairstow in action after their recent exploits in the Test match against India.

Surrey topped the South Group after starting their campaign off with nine successive wins before a slight stutter at the end of the campaign saw them win just one of their last four games, which was enough to gain a home tie with one match to go.

Yorkshire finished fourth in the North group and have been incredibly lucky to qualify for this stage of the competition, by qualifying on a technicality.

Yorkshire were beaten by Leicestershire on Sunday by 60 runs, which should have been enough for the Foxes to qualify. But hours before the start, the ECB docked the Foxes two points for poor on field behaviour in a match against Northants on Friday.

Will Jacks is the current leading run scorer for the hosts with 448 at an average of 34.46 including five half centuries. Jacks has also managed 19 maximums in his completed 13 innings with 44 fours.

Already, the hosts have hit 14 half centuries between them with a very strong batting line up that bats a long way down.

With the ball, four Surrey players have already taken ten wickets or more so far in the competition with Jordan leading the way with 17. Sunil Narine has picked up 13 with the absent Topley 15 and Curran 11.

Yorkshire will be looking to Adam Lyth to continue his excellent form in the Blast having already passed 500 runs with five half centuries at an average of a shade under 40.

The Vikings will certainly miss the services of Brook who has hit 434 runs so far and will need to rely on other players to step up their game.

On the bowling front, Jordan Thompson has already picked up 16 victims in the competition but has a high economy rate of over 10.

Local youngster Matthew Revis aged just 20 has 12 scalps to his name and lookjs a fine prospect for the county.

One big disappointment for Yorkshire has been their much talked about overseas player Shadab Khan. The Pakistani leg spinner has scored only 79 runs in ten appearances so far this season and taken only seven wickets.

Voted Player of the Tournament in the Pakistan Super League earlier in the year, you would expect him to produce a performance of note for his county. Could this be his time on the big stage in a knock out match.

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