At a glance
- Essex top before the rest of the results
- Snater and Cook – 8-31 between them
- 15 wickets fell on final day
Leicestershire 333 (Budinger 89, Snater 3-59)& 60 (Green 20, Snater 4-12)
Essex 293 (Mulder 79*, Holland 4-54) & 104-3 (Critchley 40*, Hull 2-20)
Essex win by seven wickets.
You can read the full scorecard here
Essex wrapped up a massive seven wicket win over Leicestershire, to go top of the table, before the rest of this week’s results. A total of 15 wickets fell on the final day, which set up Essex’s third win of the season.
How it all unfolded
Essex started day three on 281-8, trailing by 52 runs. Both wickets fell quickly as Essex were all out for 293, giving Leicestershire a 40 run lead.
This is where things went all wrong. Jamie Porter got the ball rolling with the wicket of Rishi Patel with the score on 4. The game then became the Snater and Cook show.
Leicestershire’s middle order was struck by a 15 ball blitz, where 29-2 became 29-5. Captain Ian Holland and Jonathan Tattersall falling to Cook, and Nick Kelly fell to Snater.
A little recovery saw the sixth wicket fall on 41. However, that was short lived as 41-6 soon became 47-9, as four wickets fell in a 24 -ball spell. Porter taking one of those four, with the other three fell to Snater.
Ben Cox tried to stick around, but no one else could, as he was the last man out for 20, and Leicestershire were 60 all out in just 27.4 overs.
Jamie Porter ended with 2-22, but it was Sam Cook and Shane Snater who were the stars. Cook ended with 4-19 off 9.4 overs, and Snater took 4-12.
The fun didn’t stop there
Essex were left to chase 101 for victory. However, alarm bells must have started ringing, as Essex were reduced to 27-3, Josh Hull taking two and Ben Green getting the third.
Sensible batting was the order of the day after that mini collapse, and Charlie Allison (34*) and Matt Critchley (40*) saw Essex home for back-to-back wins and their third of the season, with seven wickets to spare.
“It’s been a fairly bizarre day”
Essex captain Tom Westley had this to say after his side’s win:
“It’s been a fairly bizarre day, hasn’t it? We spoke before this two-game block, it was really important for us to get two wins and climb the table. And we’ve managed to do it.
“We haven’t always done it in the easiest way possible but I think it is testament to the character of the players to turn a game around the way that we have after that abysmal first session of day one. It’s incredible.”
Westley also had some words for his bowling attack, after they set up the win in spectacular fashion. He said:
“That was a very special bowling display, to bowl a team out for 60 and take 10 wickets in a session is an incredible effort. It looks like an easy win, but for a lot of the game, we were behind the eight-ball.
“We spoke as a bowling unit before the start of play how much experience we have in the team and how much better we are than we showed in the first innings. It’s very, very rare you see that at Chelmsford with our attack.”
Both sides now will prepare for the Vitality T20 Blast, which starts at the end of May.
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