A scintillating innings by Brad Hodge, Leicestershire’s Australian captain, brought Surrey’s domination in Twenty20 Cup cricket to an ignominious end last night. Thanks to Hodge, who smashed 77 from 53 balls, Leicestershire overhauled Surrey’s score of 168 for six, to beat the holders in the final at Edgbaston. It was Surrey’s first defeat in 14 Twenty20 matches.

Hodge, who stroked 10 fours and a six, gave his side a rocket-propelled launch with a 25-ball half-century as he and Darren Maddy, who had earlier shone in a semi-final victory over Glamorgan, took advantage of the fielding restrictions to post 62 inside six overs. Rikki Clarke, overlooked for England’s one-day squad on Friday, conceded 21 in an over and Azhar Mahmood 15 in another.

Hodge’s blitz ensured that Adam Hollioake was denied the big finish he craved to his Surrey career. Hollioake, whose final season has been spoiled by ankle problems, is due to retire next month and will probably still opt to play on to help Surrey — who have endured a difficult season under Hollioake’s successor as captain, Jon Batty — fight to avoid relegation.

Hollioake, with two wickets to his name, bowled the penultimate over of the match with the game seemingly in the balance with 20 needed, but Hodge and Jeremy Snape, who helped his captain score the last 47, plundered it for 16.

Snape’s share of the stand was a nerveless 34 off 16 balls with three fours and two sixes — to take amends from some expensive bowling earlier in the day — and after driving James Ormond to the on-side boundary from the first ball of the final over ran off around the field with bat raised, pursued by his ecstatic teammates.

This was Leicestershire’s first trophy for six years and was thoroughly deserved after a vibrant campaign characterised by heavy scoring from the likes of Hodge and Maddy.

Hodge, 29, who has never been capped by Australia, took over the captaincy from Phillip DeFreitas midway through last season, but it was not certain he would return this year after the county were relegated in both championship and national league.

But he did and has given purpose to their season in this competition. A team made up of imports and exiles — Snape is on his third county — they languish low in the second division in the championship.

Apart from Maddy and Snape, Hodge was given good support by Darren Stevens, with a brisk 20 from 22 balls.

Surrey’s score was built around an innings no less destructive in quality than Hodge’s from Alistair Brown, who top-scored for Surrey for the second time in the day, with a violent 64 from 41 balls that included two sixes and nine fours. Mark Ramprakash steadied the later stages of the innings, as he had in Surrey’s first game, with an unbeaten 23 from 24 balls.

Surrey should arguably not have reached the final. Only by the skin of their teeth did they come through their match with Lancashire, once the kings of the one-day jungle but who again choked at a semi-final stage chasing a modest 134 to win. When Dominic Cork, who would have enjoyed meeting Hodge in the final as he accused him of cheating during a Twenty20 match last year, struck the first ball of the penultimate over from Hollioake straight for six, Lancashire needed just 10 from 11 balls.

Surrey ought to have been dead and buried, but next ball Cork tried to repeat the shot and was caught off a skier having smashed 25 from 13 balls.

There was little alarm in the Lancashire dug-out but the pair in the middle, Warren Hegg, the captain, and Chris Schofield were feeling the pressure in front of a crowd of 20,000. The constant cry in these games is: “Hold your nerve, hold your nerve.” But they didn’t.

They took just three singles off the rest of the over and in the last from Azhar were reluctant to try anything ambitious. Four more singles left Schofield needing two off the final ball to level the scores and take Lancashire through by virtue of losing fewer wickets but all he could do was push it into the covers and he was run out by a distance returning for the second. Surrey had won by one run.

Twenty20 cricket may be designed primarily to entertain the public, but it could ultimately revive the England team in the limited-overs sphere if it sharpens minds and bodies and creates more multi-dimensional cricketers, an endangered species. There will be questions asked about the way Hegg, Cork and Schofield went about things.

Fielding is bound to improve in quantum leaps. Innovative manoeuvres were in evidence yesterday, but so were powderpuff throws by cricketers who must improve or die.

Leicestershire were comfortable victors over Glamorgan in the second semi-final with Maddy their star with just the sort of allround performance Duncan Fletcher is looking for.

In the quarter-final round last month, Maddy had smashed 84 from 48 balls against Essex; now, he spanked 72 off 40 with a flurry of cuts and pulls — there were 10 fours and four sixes in all — to become the first man to pass 500 runs in the Twenty20. He also ran out Matthew Elliott and took the key wicket of Mark Wallace.