Steve Smith, former Australia captain looking to revive his career after being mired in a ball-tampering scandal, scored 61 runs Thursday as the Toronto Nationals defeated the Vancouver Knights by 6 wickets in the opener of the Global T20 Canada cricket tournament.
Toronto needed 25 runs to win from the final 2 overs & four from the last over. New Zealand’s Anton Devich, who finished out the innings with captain Darren Sammy, led the Nationals with 92.
The tournament is a partnership between Cricket Canada & Mercuri Group, an India-based media & talent management company.
Organisers recruited some marquee names to captain the squads in West Indies’ Sammy (Toronto), Gayle (Vancouver) & Dwayne Bravo (Winnipeg), Sri Lanka’s Lasith Malinga (Montreal) and Pakistan’s Shahid Afridi (Edmonton). A Cricket West Indies B side fills out the six-team field. The event runs through July 15.