25-year-old Glenn Phillips became only the second New Zealand batsman to hit a century in the men’s T20 World Cup, after Brendon McCullum.
Glenn Phillips recorded his second T20I century as he cracked104 runs off 64 balls against Sri Lanka in Sydney in their Super 12 encounter, which the Kiwis won by a significant margin of 65 runs in the end and have all but sealed a spot in the semi-finals with 5 points in 3 matches, and a high NRR of +3.850.
Glenn Phillips shows his superhuman running speed
In quite an interesting bit of incident, which has now gone viral on social media, Glenn Phillips showcased his turbo-charged running speed in the last over of New Zealand’s innings.
On the third ball of the last over, Mitchell Santner was facing pacer Lahiru Kumara with Phillips on the non-striker’s end. As Kumara ran in to bowl, Phillips had already crouched low in a starting running position which athletes take before they begin their races or sprints.
Instead of keeping his bat behind the non-striker’s end, Phillips had his leg inside the crease – so as to avoid getting run out at the non-striker’s end, but also to be quick to take a single and get back on strike – which is exactly what happened as Santner tapped the ball and by the time Santner was halfway down the pitch, Phillips was already near the batting end!
This incredible sprint of Glenn Phillips has gone viral on social media with some fans claiming him to be the fastest runner between the wickets, a tag which has usually been associated with MS Dhoni!
You can watch the video here:
New Zealand found themselves in early trouble at 16/3. But Glenn Phillips did the rebuilding job along with Daryl Mitchell, who scored 22 runs off 24 balls before Phillips teed off in the second half of the innings. Overall, he walloped 10 fours and 4 sixes and scored 104 runs out of the total of 167 that New Zealand put on the board.
Grabbing the Player of the Match award, Glenn Phillips said, “My conversation (with Mitchell) was to carry on as long as possible, play the right possible shots, was a little difficult against the slower balls, but we managed to get to a competitive total. I couldn’t put away the slower ones, but managed to execute my skills against the pacers, especially when pace was on. The bowlers did well later on.
“I did cramp up a bit, lack of salts possibly there, the boys asked me not to take any further risks on limping away). They swung the new ball (Boult and Southee), the slower ones were holding onto the surface, getting early wickets was crucial and we managed to do that early. It was an exceptional performance by our bowlers and fielders, we were high on energy right throughout.”
