Metro Bank One Day Cup: Essex Men v Hampshire Men: Hampshire (321-7) beat Essex (317) by three wickets

By Martin Smith at Chelmsford, ECB Reporters Network supported by Rothesay

James Fuller refused to give up a lost cause as he hammered 58 from 31 balls to squeeze Hampshire home by three wickets in a thrilling climax to their Metro Bank Cup match at Chelmsford.

Hampshire were tottering at 224-6, chasing 318 to win, when the big-hitting all-rounder came to the crease. Eighteen runs off an over by Luc Benkenstein, including two of Fuller’s four sixes, turned a game that looked to slipping away from the visitors when they slumped from 193-3 to 237-7 inside eight overs. Andrew Neal, with 33 from 24 balls, was almost as equally destructive in an unbroken partnership of 92 in 50 balls.

Essex had been pegged back to 317 all out by a fine spell by Hampshire’s Indian all-rounder Ashutosh Sharm, who returned career-best List A figures of 5-52. Fuller’s late heroics overshadowed Noah Thain’s second century in 48 hours. The unflustered 21-year-old all-rounder took his output to 325 runs in four 50-over innings with a 96-ball 109.

Thain had shown his intent by giving himself room and launching Oliver Williams over extra cover for six in only the second over.

Opting for first use of a fresh pitch, the opening pair rattled along at nearly eight an over until James Fuller had Luc Benkenstein mistiming one that got up to mid-on.

The rate dipped slightly while Thain and Tom Westley put on 63 in 11 overs before Sharma struck twice in four balls with Westley holing out at backward point and Charlie Allison getting one that kept low.

Thain was unperturbed and reached three figures by thrashing Williams back past the bowler for his 16th four from 84 balls. But a dozen balls later he became the first of two quick scalps for Andrew Neal, lbw attempting to sweep. Matt Critchley followed to one that turned.

An entertaining sixth-wicket stand of 54 in seven overs between Simon Harmer and Grant Roelofsen ended when Harmer pulled Abbott to short fine leg. But after Roelofsen departed for 52 from 35 balls, including two huge sixes, Sharma polished off the Essex tail with three wickets in 11 balls.

Essex made an initial breakthrough when Ali Orr went to the fourth ball of the innings, pushing loosely outside off-stump to Shane Snater. But they had to wait another 16 overs for the next one by which time Gubbins and Middleton had made significant inroads into the chase.

The pair ran well between the wickets to pile pressure on the field before Middleton followed a maximum over long-on off Critchley by being bowled next ball. And after fifty at better than a run-a-ball, Gubbins soon joined him in the pavilion, caught behind off Harmer.

Tom Prest and Jake Lehmann steadied things with a stand of 71, but Charlie Bennett dismissed both players in the space of five balls. Prest was caught behind off a thick edge and Lehmann drove uppishly into the covers. Sharma was lbw to the first ball of a Mackenzie Jones spell and Ben Brown was bowled from the last ball of the over. Then Neal joined Fuller to carry Hampshire over the line with 14 balls to spare.

Hampshire all-rounder James Fuller said: “I didn’t think it was a lost cause. I think all reports coming in said it was a very good surface. When I was walking out I was nervous: Simon Harmer still had two overs left, and he’s had my number plenty of times. I just wanted to see out his overs and see how the game panned out.

“After that over from Benkenstein the rate went down to six or seven = which is manageable. After that me and Nealy just needed to bat to the end of the innings, and we’d win the game. That was the discussion after the over: it was important to get into the back-end chase. It’s good to have him [Neal] coming in at nine, as he showed at Worcester the other week.

“It was hugely important to win this game; otherwise we’d have been one from three, and you’ve pretty much got to win every game. So it was hugely important. We said before the game this is one where we’ve got to stand up and land our punches. Now we go against Durham on Sunday with a bit of confidence. Batting-wise we’ve done all right; we’ve got 300 in three of the four games. It’s bowling we need to tighten up.

“We were definitely staring down the barrel of 350 at one stage, but they only got 120 in the last 20 overs and what stopped them scoring more was us taking wickets. Andrew Neal came back with some important wickets, then obviously Ash Sharma came in and was bowling mystery balls. He got four in his last spell at the death, and that shuts down a team. We signed a batter, but we’ve got an unbelievable bowler! We can’t wait to see him get going because we’ve seen some of the videos from the IPL and he’s taking down Bumrah and the big boys. We’ve got a proper golden batter here. Hopefully on Sunday we get to see the best of him.”

Essex’s Noah Thain said: “You always want to contribute to winning games, so I’m gutted we didn’t get over the line. I thought we were 20-30 runs short with the bat and credit to them for that chase at the end because we were starting to dominate.

“I thought the wicket was really good today. The way Benk also batted we put them under pressure and we got into the rhythm of scoring a boundary an over and ticking along at sevens and eights an over rather than fours. But in the end it was disappointing. The way they batted at the end took us apart.

“I enjoy opening the batting, whether it’s red-ball or white-ball. I’ll push to get as high up the order as I can. But the line-up in red-ball is obviously very strong and it would be hard to work my way up the order. But you’re always looking to get better and I hope to keep improving over the next few years. I opened until I signed here at 18, but I’ve not opened before in professional cricket.

  “It will be difficult to qualify, but we pushed hard last year. We’re a momentum team and if we can build on each win there is nothing stopping us dominating teams and winning games.”