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After a disciplined performance with the ball, the Adelaide Strikers overcame a mid-innings stagger with the bat to sneak past the Melbourne Stars.
The Adelaide Strikers have leapt to third position on the BBL ladder after mowing down the Melbourne Stars by five wickets at Adelaide Oval.
In champion spinner Rashid Khan's last appearance for the Strikers in the 2020-21 BBL season, Adelaide restricted the Stars to 7-149.
And despite a mid-innings wobble, Adelaide sealed victory with an over to spare when Tom O'Connell put down a tough outfield catch at cover, allowing Ryan Gibson to scurry through for the winning runs.
Jon Wells (36) and Gibson (22 not out) finished with a flurry after opener Phil Salt (31) provided the early fireworks.
Appearing well set, Salt skied captain Glenn Maxwell (1-19) to Liam Hatcher in the deep before Alex Carey (21) and Jake Weatherald (19) both succumbed attempting to reverse-sweep legspinner Adam Zampa (2-20).
The Strikers conceded the Bash Boost point while slumping to 4-97 before recovering during the power surge.
"Harry Conway, Frank Worrell and Wes (Agar) set the tone and put the Stars on the back foot early on," Strikers assistant coach Cam White said.
"Around the 10-over mark the game was in the balance but we definitely thought we had enough firepower to launch late."
Earlier, Nic Maddinson (48 not out) and Marcus Stoinis (47) stood tall for the Stars amid a clatter of soft dismissals and some miserly Strikers bowling.
Stoinis, out-of-sorts West Indian Andre Fletcher (12), Maxwell (0) and wicketkeeper Seb Gotch (11) all holed out tamely as the Strikers applied the squeeze.
Wes Agar (2-19) and Daniel Worrall (2-28) delivered a maiden apiece in the powerplay and Rashid (2-29) narrowly missed a hat-trick.
Nevertheless, Rashid signed off in style in his last match for Adelaide before flying to Dubai on one-day international duties for Afghanistan.
Maddinson was curtailed for much of his knock as wickets fell regularly before he exploded late with back-to-back sixes off the last two balls from Worrall to give the Stars some respectability on the scoreboard.
"Throughout the whole game they (Strikers bowlers) were very disciplined and didn't really give us much," Maddinson said.
"Another 20-30 (runs), we would have been in the game."
