Leicestershire v Lancashire, Twenty20 Cup, Grace Road

Leicestershire's walls come tumbling down

John Ward at Grace Road

June 11, 2008

Lancashire 157 for 5 (du Plessis 45) beat Leicestershire 105 (Croft 3-6) by 52 runs
Scorecard

Leicestershire, the most successful county in the brief history of Twenty20 cricket, began their 2008 campaign on a disappointing note, going down by 52 runs to Lancashire at Grace Road. Neither team batted particularly well, but while the visitors shone in patches, Leicestershire did not shine at all and were unable to challenge a moderate total. Lancashire's South African, Francois du Plessis, who held the later batting together, was crucial to the win.

Lancashire, who batted on winning the toss, began with a bang, as Lou Vincent pulled the second ball, from Garnett Kruger, over the square-leg boundary for six. They brought up their 50 in the sixth over for the loss of just Mal Loye (5), and looked on course for an impressive total. Stuart Law, returning after injury, was in control along with Vincent, until he drove a catch to deep mid-off. He was quickly followed by Vincent for 31 (26 balls), top-edging an attempted scoop to the keeper, and from 70 for 3, Lancashire never quite regained their early run rate.

The rest of the innings was held together, as has happened several times this season, by the invaluable du Plessis, still unappreciated, but possibly with his name due to become a household word - and if so, it will no doubt still be pronounced incorrectly. With bold but sensible hitting he scored 45 off 34 balls, with three fours and two sixes, before skying a catch to long-on in the penultimate over. Twelve runs came off the final over, with Cork hitting Dillon du Preez for a big six, but 157 was a rather disappointing total after a good start.

Jeremy Snape, who was only given three overs, returned the best figures of 2 for 18, while the more expensive du Preez took 2 for 37. On the whole the bowlers were too cunning for the batsmen, and they cleverly varied the pace. Boeta Dippenaar had four catching chances at long-off, taking three of them; his third, a running catch offered by Kyle Hogg, was the best of them.

Leicestershire suffered a setback in the opening over, losing HD Ackerman when he was trapped lbw by James Anderson and in the next over Cork had Dippenaar caught at slip by Law without scoring. Matt Boyce, a left-hander recently of Oakham School, fought back with some impressive strokes in his 31, but Leicestershire were soon 65 for 4 and needed more than 10 an over.

Gary Keedy bowled an interesting over to Paul Nixon, who went for some exotic strokes, including reverse sweeps: the result, four complete misses and two sixes, from a drive and a slog-sweep. But 62 were needed off the last five overs; Nixon had to tread the winepress alone, and Leicester's fate was sealed when he drove over a ball from Steven Croft, the first of the 17th over, and was bowled for 37. After him the innings folded for 105, the last five wickets for three runs.

Anderson proved a little expensive, but the attack as a whole did a good job, with du Plessis (2 for 19) and Croft (3 for 6) benefiting from the surrender of the tail.

According to the scorer, this was the first time Leicestershire have ever been bowled out in this competition. The crowd was also disappointing, with the ground barely half full.

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