Essex end Lancashire winning run

FRIENDS PROVIDENT TROPHY, GROUP D, Chelmsford
Essex 160-4 beat Lancashire 157 by six wickets(Essex 2pts, Lancashire 0pts)

Match scorecard

Varun Chopra struck 11 fours and one six in his 99-ball 72

Lancashire's 100% record in this year's Friends Provident Trophy was ended by holders Essex at Chelmsford.

The visitors' decision to bat was soon made to look questionable when they found themselves 82-8, half of which was made by Ashwell Prince (44).

Peter Moores' men rallied with a ninth-wicket stand of 68 between Luke Sutton and debutant Steve Parry to reach 157.

But, despite the loss of new England hero Ravi Bopara, Varun Chopra hit 72 as Essex eased to a six-wicket win.

Lancashire skipper Glen Chapple, Essex's destroyer at Lord's in the NatWest Trophy final 13 years ago, briefly gave Lancashire hope of making a real fight of it by reducing Essex to 33-2.

He had opposing skipper Mark Pettini caught behind for 13 before removing Bopara two overs later, caught low down at short mid-wicket by Steven Croft.

But then Chopra took over, the 21-year-old right-hander hitting a stylish fourth half-century of the campaign with the help of 10 fours.

After sharing a third-wicket stand of 82 in 21 overs with Matt Walker (34), he had scored exactly 50 in boundaries before he was stumped off the left-arm spin of Stephen Parry.

And Grant Flower and home keeper James Foster led the holders to their target with 35 deliveries to spare.

It had been Lancashire's own keeper Luke Sutton and former Cumberland all-rounder Parry, on his first Trophy start, who had spared Lancashire from a more humiliating defeat.

They came together at the fall of the eighth wicket in the 22nd over with only 82 on the board.

They got their heads down to add 74 in 22 overs before off-spinner James Middlebrook bowled slow left armer Parry for 31, an innings which contained Lancashire's only six - a straight drive at the expense of leg-spinner Danish Kaneria.

But Lancashire's total was never enough.

They got off to the worst possible start when opener Paul Horton, coming off the back of two tons in his previous two Trophy matches, had his leg stump knocked back by Graham Napier for a fourth-ball duck.

David Masters then heaped further misery by picking up three quick wickets - and, from that point, the end of Lancashire's winning start looked to the Trophy campaign looked nailed on.

Luke Sutton told BBC Radio Manchester: "We had a poor day. Ultimately we didn't get enough runs. We were probably 100 too short.

"It was a bad day at the office and we have to put it behind us.

"For some reason we weren't quite on it today. We have played a lot of cricket recently so maybe there was some tiredness in the legs.

"Steven Parry had a magnificent game on his debut. He can really be proud of himself. He'll hopefully learn a lot from the game."