The Wellington Firebirds have absolutely hammered the Otago Volts in record fashion this afternoon, notching a nine-wicket win after rolling the home side for just 47 in Alexandra.
It was a day to forget for the Volts, who posted the lowest ever total in New Zealand T20 cricket having won the toss and electing to bat.
The rot began in the first over when Jake Gibson snicked off to Nathan Smith, and it only got worse from there.
Smith, back playing in his home province, picked up three more wickets to finish with extraordinary figures of 4-5 from his four-over spell.
Left-handers Hamish Rutherford and Max Chu were both castled by similar inswinging deliveries, while the dismissals of captain Dean Foxcroft and Dale Phillips left Otago reeling at 14/5 inside five overs.
The slide continued to 20/7, then 30/9, before the final pair ironically put on 17 - the highest partnership of the innings - to get the Volts to 47.
The Firebirds raced to the target in a canter, with Tim Robinson wasting no time in continuing the onslaught, finishing on 30 not out off just 16 balls.
Nick Greenwood (10) was the only batsman to fall in the chase, while salt was rubbed further into the wound for the Volts as premier fast bowler Matt Bacon limped off the field with an injury.
Named man of the match, Smith said he just tried to make the most of the swinging ball.
"Whatever you do you wanna try land the first punch. Luckily the ball was swinging, it's a bit of a luxury having the ball swing in white ball cricket so that was nice."
Firebirds captain Nick Kelly said it was the "best lost toss of my career".
"The boys were just on today, it was a great watch.
"When we saw there was quite a bit of swing we decided to just attack. We began taking wickets regularly so we had the freedom to go out there and set aggressive fields and the bowlers backed that up today which was awesome."
Meanwhile, Volts captain Dean Foxcroft hoped his side would be able to forget the result quickly and move on to the next game on January 1.
"It's one of those games where you need to park it and put it aside and rock up to the next one, but credit to Nathan Smith, he bowled brilliantly up front and put us under pressure and we just couldn't adapt.
"We need to bounce back and reflect on this innings."
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