Yorkshire Lay Down the Law to Nottinghamshire

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Headingley Carnegie

Yorkshire Carnegie 162-3 (18.3 overs)

Nottinghamshire Outlaws 158-7 (20 overs)

Yorkshire beat Nottinghamshire by seven wickets

A measured overall performance saw Yorkshire cruise to victory over a lacklustre Nottinghamshire side. Their third successive win saw them leapfrog Lancashire, Derbyshire and Warwickshire into second place, three points behind vanquished Nottingham. The home side were without Tim Bresnan, away on international duty with England, but it was Notts who seemed to struggle without Swann, Broad and Sidebottom.

At one point the visitors had looked in control, knocking their second fifty off just 26 balls. In fact at 100-2 off just 11.2 overs they looked in total command. Notts had recovered from the early dismissals of Brown and Wood, both off Patterson, thanks to a third wicket stand of 86 between Alex Hales and Patel.

Hales' 62 off 43 balls included 3 sixes and 4 fours, taking his Twenty20 tally of runs to 290 in nine innings. His partner at the other end, Patel rattled 41 in 29 balls, but both failed to push on. Patel top edged Richard Pyrah to third man, while Pyrah pulled off a breathtaking catch on the long off boundary to dismiss Hales. From that point on, the Notts innings floundered with Mullaney and Franks unable to really punish the Yorkshire bowlers. Tino Best's second spell helped turned the screw, as did two late run outs.

A score of 158 was never going to be enough, and the Yorkshire batsmen rarely looked troubled on a good pitch. The lightning fast outfield also helped the home batsmen, with most of them using the cut shot to great effect. Captain Chris Gale was the only batsmen not to make runs, as Adam Lyth, South African Herschelle Gibbs, Gerard Brophy and Anthony McGrath all chipped in with solid knocks to take their team to a comfortable victory. Gibbs and Lyth had both gone by the time Yorkshire stood on 101-3, but whereas the Outlaws' innings had stuttered, Yorkshire drove on with Brophy hitting three fours in his first five balls at the crease. He and McGrath had no problems, and from this point onwards the game's result was never in doubt.