The cliffhanger that shouldn't have been

Perth Scorchers vs Sydney Sixers, final, BBL 2015, Canberra

Scorchers won by four wickets

It was the most dramatic finish to a BBL final - but it needn't have been.

Perth Scorchers, the defending champions, in their fourth consecutive final in the first four seasons of the competition, needed 17 off 12 with eight wickets in hand against Sydney Sixers.

Shaun Marsh was on strike, 73 not out off 58, facing Nathan Lyon. Marsh holed out to deep midwicket first ball. Two balls later, Ashton Turner holed out to the same man.

Nerves had kicked in for the chasing side. They now needed 16 from nine with six wickets in hand. But those jitters should have been quelled when Nathan Coulter-Nile launched Lyon's last delivery over deep midwicket and over the Manuka Oval fence.

Eight off six should have been a cakewalk, even if it was Brett Lee bowling in his final professional match. Michael Carberry made the equation even easier, scooping the first ball over short fine for four, punching the next through point for two, and working the third behind square for a single to ensure Scorchers needed one run from three balls for back-to-back titles.

What happened next turned a well-timed chase into one of the greatest finishes ever. Coulter-Nile stepped outside to scoop fine and was clean bowled, with Lee unfurling a ferocious chainsaw celebration. Scorchers still needed just one run from two balls with five wickets in hand.

Lee went around the wicket to the left-hander Sam Whiteman for the penultimate delivery. Whiteman shuffled legside to give room, but Lee delivered a good-length thunderbolt that crashed into the top of off. There were ashen faces in the Scorchers dugout.

One off one for victory then. Sixers needed a dot ball or a wicket for a Super Over. Lee had 3 for 25 from 3.5 overs.

The final fumble: Moises Henriques botches the run out on the last ball Mark Nolan / © CA/Getty Images

Scorchers' Pakistan import, fast bowler Yasir Arafat, walked out to take strike. Sixers captain Moises Henriques set an extraordinary field.

Henriques had earlier been Sixers' saviour with the bat. He had walked out in the third over of the match with Sixers 7 for 2, and that become 49 for 4 in the tenth over. But Henriques made 77 from 57, sharing a 98-run stand with Ryan Carters to drag the total up to a defendable 147 for 5 against an international-quality Scorchers attack.

Henriques had been pivotal with the ball too. Marsh, Michael Klinger and Adam Voges would have iced the chase a lot earlier had Henriques not delivered four overs of medium pace for just 21 runs, including nine dots and only one boundary.

All of it had given Sixers a shot at an unlikely Super Over. Arafat looked up at Lee with a catching point and two catching covers close to him. A conventional cover stood just behind them on the one. There was a mid-off who was also saving one. Henriques had stationed himself at a catching mid-on next to the non-striker, mainly to take any throw that would come to that end. There was another catching square midwicket, a conventional midwicket and a mid-on. Carters, the wicketkeeper, was the only man behind square. Not a single fielder was in the deep. Arafat only needed to clear the wall in front of him or manoeuvre a ball behind him to win the game.

Lee steamed in, on a hat-trick, for his last ball in professional cricket. He delivered a good yorker on leg stump, Arafat swung hard and scuffed it straight to the conventional midwicket fielder, who gathered and bounced a throw to the non-striker's in one smooth motion.

Henriques just had to take the throw at a comfortable height and break the stumps, as Arafat was nowhere in the frame. He broke the stumps but the ball had slipped out of his hands.

Lee slumped to his knees, pondering a cruel end to an incredible career. The entire Scorchers squad sprinted onto the field to celebrate with Arafat and Carberry. The agony and the ecstasy of the best-ever finish to a BBL final. Sydney Sixers wouldn't win another one till 2020.

Alex Malcolm is an associate editor at ESPNcricinfo

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