The Outlaws' troubles began on day one when opening batsman Charlie Kempston was dismissed for a duck and despite a fierce fightback in the middle of the batting order that shortened the gap to just 26 runs by the last four overs, was compounded when Mat Skinner was caught by James Larkin without a run, with Captain Jason Ryan joining him soon after and Ben Knaggs adding four runs before being bowled out.

"It is disappointing," Outlaws skipper Jason Ryan said immediately after the first round result.

"It shows you how brutal Twenty20 cricket can be, we're right in that game until there's two overs to go and we lose a couple, they bowl a good over and it's game over."

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Despite the close result, the disappointed Orana side were unable to put together a win in their second round clash with the Illawarra Flame, but Captain Jason Ryan said there was no faulting the effort from his side.

"I can't fault the effort of the guys, we played reasonably good cricket over the two or three games, I think the effort was there, we just lacked a little bit with the execution, a few big dropped catches cost us on Sunday morning against Illawarra," Ryan said.

"That first day against the Wranglers, it was only two or three bad overs that cost us the game at the end, the whole thing could have changed quite easily if we'd performed a little better at those certain key moments."

Opening Flames batsman Tane Nunn put together a half century before Orana were able to dismiss him, in a spate of dropped catches that proved costly for the Outlaws, who lost ten wickets en route to 104 runs in the ensuing chase.

"I think we dropped five catches in that first set against those opening batsmen, we had plenty of opportunities to get that breakthrough, but we just missed some of those simple chances, we've only got ourselves to blame; we dropped a few easy ones," Ryan said.

"We still kept them to a very chase-able total, but we didn't get off to the best start with the bat in that inning."

The Flames prevailed 159 for 8, bouncing the Outlaws out of the competition and ensuring their third round clash with the South Coast Crew was a dead rubber.

In that match-up, the Outlaws found their pace, setting up a 154 run total thanks to the persistence of Zac Bayliss, who put up 67 runs as part of the opening pairing.

"It was a really good effort, we started slow with the bat and we were more conservative, we changed the line-up, but we knew their game before had been around 120 and wend to the last ball, so we figured if we could get past that, it'd be a competitive score," Ryan said.

The match ended with veteran Marty Jeffrey and newcomer Gaurav Sharma taking six wickets between then in the last over and giving the Outlaws the win.

"We finished those last three or four overs really well, so I was very happy with 154."