Essex through to Twenty20 Finals Day

9:35am Tuesday 8th July 2008

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Essex booked their place in the Twenty20 finals at the Rose Bowl with a 59-run victory over Northamptonshire under the Duckworth/Lewis method at Chelmsford.

The home side had posted 192 for nine from their full allocation of overs but rain then delayed the visitors' reply and, when play resumed, their target had been revised to 175 from 18 overs.

However, they made a disastrous start, losing their first three wickets for three runs within the opening 12 deliveries of their reply.

And their situation became even more miserable when two more wickets went quickly to leave them 27 for five and facing inevitable defeat before they rallied a little to finish on 115 for seven.

Graham Napier, having earlier struck a typical quickfire 40, showed his all-round talents by claiming three of the first five wickets to fall to enjoy figures of three for seven in three overs.

Fellow new-ball partner David Masters grabbed a couple of victims as three of the top four in the visitors' batting order departed without a run to their name.

James Foster also got in on the destructive act, taking three catches as the visitors offered a poor response.

Sixth-wicket pair Steven Crook and Nicky Boje doubled the score but, when Crook was bowled by Maurice Chambers for ten, the end was in sight for Northants.

Lance Klusener and Boje, though, gallantly added some sort of respect to the total with 61 from the remaining six overs.

Boje reached an undefeated 43-ball 58 that included eight of the nine boundaries in the innings.

Napier, though, was to have the final word when Klusener sent the final delivery of the game into the hands of Masters at long-on to complete a marvellous three days for Essex, who had booked a Lord's final date with Kent after beating Yorkshire in the Friends Provident Trophy semi-final on Saturday.

The start of the match was delayed by 20 minutes after heavy afternoon rain that ceased a couple of hours before the scheduled start time but, after mopping up operations had been completed, the game eventually started in bright sunshine.

Top scorer for the home side was Ravi Bopara, who hit 47 in only his second match in the competition this summer. Opening the innings, the right-hander joined Mark Pettini in putting on 68 in seven overs for the first wicket before both batsmen fell in successive overs.

Bopara cleared the boundary twice and reached the ropes on seven other occasions from the 27 deliveries faced before he was stumped off left-arm spinner Boje while the Essex skipper was bowled by fellow spinner Jason Brown for 17.

With man-of-the-moment Napier held back from facing the slow bowlers, Grant Flower was promoted to the number three position and put on 62 with James Foster in seven overs with the latter splendidly improvising to work the ball around the field.

Boje, though, was the partnership-breaker again when he bowled Foster around his legs for 26 and, when Flower was caught behind the wicket for 33 on the drive against Johannes van der Wath, the home side were 134 for four with just five overs remaining and Napier now at the crease.

He struck a six from the fourth ball he faced and added two further huge blows while also accruing three other boundaries in a typical whirlwind approach, taking 20 balls to reach 40 before driving to long-on.

With Ryan ten Doeschate, he had posted 54 in three overs as the pair set about pacemen van der Wath, Johann Louw and Andrew Hall but ten Doeschate (ten) skied the ball to long-on and the visitors pulled themselves back into the game.

Essex lost five wickets in the last eight balls of the innings for just four runs that included two run-outs but it was to have no impact on the eventual outcome.