Wood's four wickets kill Glamorgan chase

Hampshire bounced back from defeat last week with a NatWest Blast T20 victory over Glamorgan by 21 runs on a tired pitch at the SWALEC Stadium.

Those conditions were very much to the liking of the Hampshire attack, who did a fine job of defending 149 in the South Group contest.

Sean Ervine's 49 runs anchored the Hampshire innings, before a brilliant spell from Chris Wood made sure the home side finished a long way short of the target.

It started so well for Glamorgan. Their fans were made to wait for Wayne Parnell to make his debut but once he had recovered from the groin injury that saw him miss the first two fixtures of the season he made an immediate impact.

The South African left-armer claimed the wicket of James Vince from the fifth ball of the match caught at first slip by Colin Ingram, then in his second over he had Jimmy Adams caught at third man by Craig Meschede.

The wickets continued to tumble as Graham Wagg replaced Parnell at the River Taff End and picked up two more wickets, dismissing Michael Carberry and Owais Shah. Wagg was fantastic throughout the Hampshire innings, finishing with 4 for 27 from his four overs.

Ervine combined with Adam Wheater to put on 34 runs in four overs before Wheater holed out to Parnell at long-on off the bowling of Andrew Salter.

While the wickets fell around him Ervine continued to hold the Hampshire effort together. When Ervine fell leg before wicket to Wagg for 49 Will Smith took up the fight. Smith's 30 off 24 balls was enough to see his side to a competitive total on a worn pitch.

The Glamorgan chase could not have got off to a worse start as Ben Wright, Chris Cooke and Ingram were all bowled inside the first four overs. Wood was the chief destroyer with two of those wickets to leave Glamorgan struggling at 13 for 3.

The 69 runs Rudolph and Mark Wallace put on was the only partnership of note for the hosts - and when Rudolph mistimed a pull off Ervine to depart for 38 it was the beginning of the end for the Welsh county.

A rain delay took the players from the field for 20 minutes and when the action resumed the Glamorgan batsman could not find a way to score quickly while keeping wickets intact.

Wallace played a lone hand in trying to get his side home but he alone could not keep the run rate under control. His 37 from 41 balls was the home team's most telling contribution with the bat.

Glamorgan's second defeat in a row at home means they will be hoping for a significantly improved performance when in-form Middlesex visit Cardiff next week .

For Hampshire, this is a welcome return to winning ways - with Wood's four wickets for just 16 runs after a disappointing performance against Kent pleasing for the visitors.

Rudolph blamed his side's poor start for the setback. He said: "The fact that we lost three wickets for the first 10 runs put us a bit behind the eight ball. However, I thought with the partnership that myself and Mark Wallace had I think we still needed just over 90 runs in the last 60 balls with wickets in hand, you should potentially back yourself.

"I think we lost a little bit of momentum when the rain came but it is not an excuse. We got to be a little bit hard on ourselves.''