Alex Dore put Willow Cuts to the sword to power Southampton Rangers to an emphatic eight-wicket victory in today’s Twenty20 final at Somerset Cricket Club.

The teenaged all-rounder blasted 55 runs from just 20 deliveries and featured in an unbroken 40-run third-wicket partnership with Ian Armstrong (17) that carried a Rangers side missing star pair Janeiro Tucker and Dion Stovell across the line with nine balls to spare.

Dores thumped five sixes and three fours in a match-winning partnership that took the game completely away from Cuts.

The left-handed batsman also added 50 runs for the second wicket with Gerald Simons (19) after Curtis Jackson (36) departed in the tenth over with Rangers slightly behind the run rate.

Rangers required 27 from the last three overs.

But some loose bowling at the death lifted the pressure off as Dore and Armstrong took full advantage to place Rangers in the ascendancy.

Cuts all-rounder Deunte Darrell was among the bowlers that bore the brunt of the carnage, going for 17 in the eighteenth over as Rangers raced to the brink of victory.

The end would be swift for Cuts as Dores hoisted Dean Stephens, the former Rangers all-rounder, over the mid-wicket fence for six to reach his half-century in the penultimate over of the match, with the winning runs coming off the next delivery via four leg byes at the vacant fine leg boundary.

Earlier Rangers got their run chase off to a solid start after opening pair Simons and Jackson added 50 runs for the first wicket as Cuts failed to make inroads with the new ball on a track offering very little lateral movement off the seam.

“I told the guys I wanted them to go out there and bat like they are used to batting ... if you want to hit the ball hit it,” Ricky Brangman, the Rangers coach, explained. “I told them to just out there and do what they had to do. I am very proud because the attitude was good and it’s a good win.”

Seam bowlers Sheroy Fubler and teenager Micah Simons claimed the two Rangers wickets to fall.

Simons made the breakthrough when he had Jackson caught by Sheroy Fubler on the deep mid-wicket boundary. Jackson was let off the hook the previous over when Simons, attempting a catch at deep mid-wicket, only succeeded in helping the ball clear the boundary for six off the bowling of Stephens.

Fourth-change bowler Fubler claimed the wicket of Simons after trapping the batsman leg before in the fifteenth over.

By then, however, Rangers were on course with plenty of overs remaining and wickets in hand.

Simons took one for 16 and Fubler one for 17.

Rangers laid the foundation for their impressive victory by keeping a powerful Cuts batting order in check.

Cuts made a promising start when opener Dwight Basden (25) clipped Ryan Belboda to the fine-leg boundary for four off the first ball of the innings.

Belboda eventually found his line and length and made the breakthrough two overs later with a straight delivery that clattered Ryan Sheppard’s stumps after the batsman swung and missed playing across the line.

Despite losing Sheppard Cuts appeared to be in control with Basden and Sheroy Fubler (12) adding 32 runs for the second wicket in four overs before Basden lost his composure, charged left-arm spinner Dore, and was stumped by wicketkeeper Rohaan Simons.

Cuts were fortunate not to lose another wicket in quick succession as Darrell was put down at mid-off off the first ball he faced from left-arm spinner Vernon Eve.

Fubler and Darrell had added just one run to the total when the former went for a second run that was never on and was run out by wicketkeeper’s Simons’s throw at the non striker’s end.

Cuts were 61 for three at the halfway stage of their innings and in desperate need of some explosive hitting the boost the run rate.

Darrell and Stephens obliged, thumping 42 runs for the fourth wicket in five overs to breath life into the innings.

But just as the two batsmen began cutting loose stock bowler Chris Pitcher was brought into the attack. In the space of one over Pitcher had Stephens caught at long-off with his first delivery from the northern end of the ground and then Darrell bowled behind his legs.

“That was a big over because you had Deunte and Dean batting and they can change a game in a minute,” Brangman said. “I told him he was going to have to bowl an over today because we were short of bowlers and he done a good job.”

Cuts lost a third wicket in the space of five runs as Bergon Spencer lashed out at teenage seam bowler Dalin Richardson and was bowled.

That Cuts posted as many runs as they did owed to a late flurry by Kavon Fubler who blasted 24, that included three boundaries, and added 15 runs for the seventh wicket with Joseph Basden, and 28 for the eighth with Kamal Bashir before he became the last wicket to fall in the eighteenth over.

Pitcher took two for 14 and Belboda two for 25.

Last season’s final between Rangers and Cuts was called off for safety reasons because of a shooting incident on South Shore Road, Southampton, hours after the completion of the two semi-finals in September in St David’s.