Yorkshire 175 for 3 (Brook 60*, Lyth 40, Root 35*, Malan 33) beat Worcestershire 172 for 9 (Haynes 61, D’Oliveira 32, Thompson 3-35) by seven wickets
Two trophyless appearances at Finals Day are the paltry sum of 20 years of T20 cricket for Yorkshire, as if somehow their illustrious history inhibits them in the shortest format of the game. You can imagine the ghost of Wilfred Rhodes emerging from behind the Howard Stand, whenever they set their minds free, chiding: “We don’t play this game for fun.” Perhaps this will be the year they put all that behind them, emerging from a troubled winter with a new outlook. A seven-wicket win with 11 balls to spare was a good way to start.
There was work to do for Yorkshire and the middle overs were in the hands of the spin partnership that they hope will bring them sustenance this season, Adil Rashid and Shadab (the best spin combo at Headingley since Rashid and Azeem Rafiq, and as everybody knows there hangs a tale or two).
Shadab looked in trim, whereas Rashid began rustily, having had no meaningful cricket since the end of January in Bridgetown, and generally looked dissatisfied with his rhythm, but still somehow emerged with 0 for 30 from four. Yorkshire still hope he will relax his white-ball stance and play an occasional red-ball game and, on this evidence, it would benefit all parties.
With no wickets from either spinner, Worcestershire held the upper hand but they declined the moment that Haynes swung Matthew Revis to deep midwicket. Haynes and D’Oliveira had gone down the ground with ease, but what followed was largely a collection of nudges and half-hits. Revis’ only two previous T20 matches had been ones of supreme inactivity, but he has had a decent Championship season and the wicket of Haynes was a good way to start. Thompson, milked earlier, returned bullishly, with two late wickets.
Kohler-Cadmore’s return was unrewarding as he chose to slog-sweep the first ball he faced from D’Oliveira, his fourth and was bowled. Lyth had set up the innings to good effect; Malan played a classic Malan computerised innings before casually holing out to the long side at deep midwicket with 33 from 30 and the game in the balance.
Brook and Root made light of that. Brook was particularly severe on Barnard and Pat Brown, who have outdone many a T20 batter in the past. A punch over wide long-off off Barnard and uppercut against Brown over backward point were among the highlights.
If Root had batted at No. 3 at Lord’s, of course, there would have been room for Brook to make his Test debut. Instead, with nine scores of fifty-plus to his name in 10 innings this season, he goes to Lord’s amid premature indications that he must await his opportunity. Not the sort of thing to chat to Root about in a match-winning T20 partnership – but certainly the sort of thing to mull over while you were watching it.