Kent Spitfires, the reigning Vitality Blast champions, maintained their poor title defence with a 32-run loss to Surrey at Canterbury.

The Spitfires have now lost all five Blast matches this season, and despite restricting Surrey to 159 for 6, they were reduced to 127 for 9 in response. The visitors cruised to victory, smothering Kent’s run chase and sharing the wickets among themselves, with all six bowlers claiming at least one victim.

Surrey’s best results were 3 for 24 from Reece Topley and 2 for 27 from Chris Jordan. Joe Denly scored 44 points for Kent, but he didn’t get much help during a disastrous run pursuit.

Surrey’s best scorer was Sam Curran, who scored 43 points, while Jamie Overton added 27 late in the game to turn the tide in the visitors’ favour. Both Fred Klaassen and Grant Stewart took two wickets each, although both men should have had more as Kent’s improved fielding was still plagued by a number of dropped catches.

Kent looked sharper in the field than they have at times this season, despite winning the toss and opting to bowl, allowing the visitors 10-20 more runs than they would have if they had taken their catches.

In the second over, Will Jacks was dismissed for two runs after a terrible swipe from Klaassen flew almost vertically off the top edge before being caught by Denly. Curran, who had given Sam Billings a difficult chance off Qais Ahmad when he was on 35, misread a sweep ball and was caught by Klaassen off Matt Milnes. Jason Roy hit 23 before being bowled by Grant Stewart.

At the start of the 14th over, Sunil Narine hit the first six of the innings when he pushed Stewart over the square leg boundary, but as Surrey attempted to pace, Laurie Evans was lbw to a Klassen Yorker for 19 and Narine smashed Stewart to Denly at long-on. Jordan Clark was dropped by Jack Leaning, who may have been distracted by the inrushing Denly, denying Stewart a third wicket.

Overton blasted Klaassen for consecutive sixes in the final over before being dropped by Daniel Bell-Drummond and run out for 27 by Billings, who was chasing a single off the final ball of the innings.

In the second over, Bell-Drummond flipped Clark to Narine at short fine leg for barely three runs, and Daniel Worrall subsequently had Jordan Cox caught behind for two runs. Billings was caught for 16 by Jacks when he holed out to Overton, and Alex Blake was out for the same score when he pulled Jordan to Clark. Kent were 75 for 5 in the 14th over when Narine enticed Jack Leaning to waft a delivery to Jordan for only one run.

With five overs remaining, the rate had risen to 15, and with no alternative but to go down swinging, George Linde was dismissed for 13 by Jordan’s excellent fielding. Topley was driven to the boundary by Linde, but Jordan tossed the ball in the air before stepping over the line and back in to complete the catch.

Fans began to leave in droves well before the conclusion, and while they missed some late fireworks from Stewart, who smashed sixes off successive Topley deliveries, he was dismissed for 17 when he skied to Jamie Smith behind the stumps. Denly dropped in nearly identical fashion to the penultimate ball of the 19th over, leaving Kent requiring a staggering 42 from the next six balls. Evans of Jordan caught Ahmad for five points, but it was a moot point at that point.