Gloucestershire 109 for 2 (Bracey 49*, Bancroft 39) beat Sussex 106 (Carson 26, M Taylor 3-25, Smith 3-25) by eight wickets
Gloucestershire booked themselves a West Country showdown with local rivals Somerset in the Vitality Blast final, to give themselves a shot at their first silverware for close to a decade, as well as their maiden title in this competition, after a crushingly effective eight-wicket victory over Sussex in the second semi-final at Edgbaston.
Sussex hadn’t had a prayer with so few runs to play with. Tymal Mills, doubtless ruing his call at the toss, tried to frontload his strike bowling, with Robinson relatively misery but wicketless in his four overs for 23, while the only other successful bowler was James Coles, whose 1 for 17 in three overs will count as further experience banked at the end of a breakthrough campaign.
Payne and Taylor boss the powerplay
David Payne’s harnessing of swing in the powerplay is his “super-strength”, as he told ESPNcricinfo in the build-up, and with metronomic inevitability he proved true to his word once again. His 21st powerplay wicket of the campaign, and tournament-leading 30th overall, was the whopper that Gloucestershire needed above all others.
With 595 runs at 42.50 going into Finals Day, Daniel Hughes had been the rock of Sussex’s batting all season long, but he’d extended his tally by just one more run when Payne outfoxed him in his second over. With a hint of shape from over the wicket, he lured Hughes across his crease then beat his intentions with some extra bounce, the under-edge deflecting into his own stumps.
Five balls – and no runs – later, Sussex’s innings was officially in the soup. Matt Taylor’s low full toss wasn’t quite the yorker he was aiming for, but then nor was Harrison Ward’s leading-edged response. Hammond snaffled the low deflection that somehow carried to mid-on, and though James Coles then cracked three of Taylor’s next four balls for four, he too fell to the fifth, as Bancroft intercepted at short midwicket.
Taylor’s third and final wicket, however, was a true collector’s item. Round the wicket, perfect line and length, it gripped the dry pitch and ripped and bounced like a legbreak through Tom Alsop’s half-formed defences. His hat-trick ball was too full to trouble John Simpson – “you greedy boy!” joked James Bracey over the stump mic, but at 35 for 4 at the end of the powerplay, Sussex were scrambling for anything competitive.
Price is right for middle overs
Ollie Price’s first two balls weren’t the most auspicious. Five wides first-up, then four more byes as a very tight appeal for lbw deceived both batter and keeper. His third ball, however, was bang on the money. Round the wicket to the left-handed Tom Clark, and straightening just enough out of the footholes to peg back his off stump as Clark missed his sweep.
And, after a solitary over for his brother Tom, Ollie made it two wickets in as many overs as Fynn Hudson-Prentice, one ball after finding the stands at deep midwicket, found the fielder there instead, as he got too greedy on a dragged-down delivery, and picked out Hammond’s safe hands once more to depart for a run-a-ball 13.
No let-up through the back end
Five balls was enough for Tom Smith to prise out Sussex’s last realistic hope of a defendable total. Simpson also succumbed to the sweep as he was nailed on the full, just in line with off stump, leaving Sussex beached on 64 for 7 in the tenth, with little option but to bat out the overs and take whatever they could muster.
Ollie Robinson and Jack Carson obliged for a time, adding a run-a-ball 37 to drag the total past 100. But back came Smith, tossing it above Robinson’s eyeline to lure a hack to deep mid-off. One ball later, he and James Bracey combined for a moment that might have been designed as Jack Russell-Mark Alleyne tribute act, as Smith fired a faster delivery past the pads of the incoming Mills, and the unsighted Bracey whipped off the bails for a stumping that would have graced the club’s trophy-winning glory days at the turn of the 2000s.
Andrew Miller is UK editor of ESPNcricinfo. @miller_cricket
Source: ESPN Crickinfo