Kent Spitfires' T20 Blast hopes ended at the quarter-final stage on Thursday when they suffered a comprehensive 56-run defeat to Surrey at The Oval.

Having restricted the hosts to 169-2, Kent's much-heralded top four of Zak Crawley, Daniel Bell-Drummond, Joe Denly and Sam Billings all succumbed to the off-spin of Will Jacks.

The Surrey man finished with stunning career-best figures of 4-15 as the hosts strangled Kent's reply before it had hardly got started.

Jacks removed Bell-Drummond via an attempted sweep and Crawley when he tried to cut in his first over.

Denly then picked out Jamie Overton in the deep when he tried to go big over mid-wicket, going for 16 to leave Kent 40-3 after 7.1 overs.

And it was game over when Billings was bowled for 18. Spitfires were 51-4 in the 10th over.

Alex Blake departed shortly after for 14 and it was Jack Leaning who ended up top scoring with a creditable 34.

Spitfires left Heino Kuhn out of their side from the team which lost the final group stage match against the same team at the same venue, with Tim Groenewald selected to provide an extra bowling option.

Surrey had enjoyed most of their success in the group stages by chasing down totals so it was no surprise that Kent opted to bowl first after winning the toss.

Kent got through two overs of Denly’s leg spin in the powerplay but Surrey advanced without alarm to 50-0 from their first six overs.

England’s Jason Roy and South African Hashim Amla increased their tally to 81-0 in the first 10 overs with Roy first to bring up his half-century, taking 39 balls with seven fours.

Amla, who showed more improvisation, reached his half-century in 35 balls with eight boundaries.

Umpires Martin Saggers and Nick Cook spoke to Kent captain Billings after he threw the ball to the ground in disgust after a run out appeal against Roy was turned down.

Roy went the next ball, though, when he skied Imran Qayyum on 56 with Alex Blake taking the catch – making it 114-1 in the 13th over.

Denly was Kent’s most economical bowler, conceding just 24 runs from four wicketless overs.

Qayyum struck again in his next over, Blake again proving a safe pair of hands after he was picked out at long-on by Laurie Evans to leave Surrey 125-2 in 15 overs.

Qayyum finished with figures of 2-34 after conceding a couple of boundaries to Jacks in his final over.

Fred Klaassen produced an excellent penultimate over, conceding just four runs and hitting Jacks on the helmet with a short delivery, as Kent successfully stemmed the flow of runs.

Groenewald bowled the final over of Surrey’s innings, Amla hitting a six over extra cover from a slower ball as he finished 72 not out from 52 balls.

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