FRIENDS PROVIDENT TROPHY GROUP D, Chelmsford
Essex 282-3 beat Northamptonshire 281 by seven wickets(Essex 2pts, Northants 0pts)

Walker is in his first season with Essex, after moving to Chelmsford from Kent

Holders Essex began their defence of the Friends Provident Trophy with a seven-wicket victory over Northamptonshire at Chelmsford.

New signing Matt Walker's unbeaten 69 from 65 balls led Essex to their target of 282 with 10 balls to spare.

Varun Chopra (76) and Mark Pettini (57) also contributed for the home side.

Earlier, Steven Crook hammered 72 from 53 balls after a partnership of 102 between Riki Wessels (57) and Nicky Boje (56) rescued Northants from 66-4.

On such a a good wicket, Northants never really had enough runs to defend, and it was an easy chase for Essex - even though they were without the batting of Alastair Cook and Ravi Bopara.

Monty Panesar showed some new variations in pace, but could not extract great turn from the surface and took 1-52 from nine overs.

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