predictably unpredictable

the phrase most associated with essex over the last ten years. a competitive south group needed consistently good performances that essex just didn't put in. defending champions hampshire, runners up somerset and the likes of sussex and surrey were always likely to pose essex a threat but with this 'superb' batting order - surely we could overcome such a challenge?

the campaign started down at hove and after winning the toss, foster put sussex into bat. essex have always been a fan of chasing a total down and i personally prefer that - batting first, there's always a risk of not knowing what a good score is. when you know your target, you can usually prepare yourself a lot better tactically.
sussex's innings ended on 173-4, murray goodwin top scoring with 53. three wickets from tim phillips, who went on to impress throughout the whole competition. the other wicket from the new addition to the squad, new zealand international, tim southee. 174 not the easiest target to chase down but with the batsmen all the way through the team, you'd expect essex to be there or there abouts.
sadly with the exception of kiwi t20 superstar styris, the rest of the batting order collapsed and essex were all out for 141.

the next game was said to be a little easier and proved to be a walk in the park for essex. we set gloucs an ambitious 205 to win, which would seem to be a winning score for anyone else but you can never be too sure when essex are concerned and of course, gloucestershire had ireland's world cup hero kevin o'brien turning out for them. luckily like the rest of his team, they faded away into nothing and essex's bowlers finished them off quickly - dismissing them for 82 all out. fortress chelmsford had seen what we all hoped was going to be the first win of many in the competition.

back to back home games saw sussex visit chelmsford, essex fans praying for revenge after the sharks' relatively comfortable win a few days beforehand. again essex decided that they wanted the sharks to bat first and yet again, sussex posted a good but not unbeatable target. luke wright passed 1500 runs in twenty20 matches when he reached 74, finishing on 81 not out. again, there were three more wickets for left arm spinner phillips. unfortunately, the batting was disappointing and we finished 17 runs short of the target. people were already starting to question the batsmen's order and/or places in the side - why is such a good t20 batting order, maybe even the best in the country, constantly finishing short of the mark? there's quality from 1-11 - that is undisputed but everybody seemed puzzled by the lack of form showed by key players - ten doeschate and bopara are good examples of this.

the day later, essex went to the home of cricket knowing they needed a win to get themselves back in the group - other teams had started brightly and essex couldnt afford to be left behind. middlesex opted to bat first and set essex 151 to win - a below par score which many expected essex to reach easily. this time we did get there but made things a lot harder of ourselves than we needed to. owais shah's match winning 78 was the only thing to write home about, alongside a solid knock from captain foster, 30 from 18 balls. - both openers out for ducks and disappointing scores from walker and ten doeschate.

monday 13th june saw the eagles' charge to glory move onto the oval. napier took two wickets in his first two overs - taking the wickets of captain, hamilton-brown and england wicketkeeper, steven davies. roy, maynard and de bruyn all making decent scores. the impressive youngster ansari on his debut, added a delightfully entertaining 30 at the end. after being set the mediocre target of 155, you can probably guess what happened next. yes, you guessed it - cue a dreadful batting performance. only foster and wheater scoring more than 20, with the injured napier out for a golden duck and big hitting tim southee run out without scoring. all out for 111 was simply not good enough - the players and coaches themselves had admitted this.

back to chelmsford to take on somerset - the runners up in the 2010 competition and argubably, the best all round one day outfit in the country. their star man marcus trescothick scored a fantastic 108 off only 61 deliveries. hildreth and trego also looking impressive - meaning essex had to score 226. it would only be possible if essex used the powerplay wisely and got off to a flyer. only two players got into double figures - a throughly frustrating performance which left a bitter taste in the mouth. all out for 82 turned out to be essex's worst performance of the season and somerset left chelsmford knowing they'd spanked essex and more importantly, taken two crucial points with them.

the match down at bristol which essex would have been confident of getting two points from was rained off.

glamorgan at sophia gardens was the next test for the eagles. glamorgan didnt set the world alight with their average batting and this gave essex hope that they could indeed reach 142. of course essex tried their best to lose it, keeping glamorgan in the game right till the end, with three of the six wickets coming from careless run outs. luckily for essex, shah put in a man of the match performance and saved essex.

champions hampshire arrived in chelmsford with shahid afridi ready to make his first appearance of the season - another factor which seemed to suggest essex were under dogs for this huge clash - hampshire were unbeaten before their visit to the county ground and had been in a great form. the experiment to promote southee to open with pettini seemed a huge risk at the time but with his massive 74 and a valuable contribution from fellow bowler tim phillips, the county ground was rocking - it was raining sixes! essex reached 162, which was a good score but we had to be careful - it is well documented how many good players hampshire have. vince, mckenzie, cork, mascarenhas, to name a few. however, the 'two tims' really helped swing the game in essex's favour - taking seven wickets between them. the dismissal of afridi for two was a massive wicket and essex ended up winning by 26 runs. argubably, the highlight of the twenty20 campaign and i cannot think of a better all round team performance than that one against the royals.

alastair cook was allowed to join up with the essex squad for the game against surrey at chelmsford to get a chance in the shortest form of the game, with the ODI series quickly approaching. however, he had no time at the crease as did no one else as not one ball was bowled at the county ground - downpurs for four hours ensured no play was possible. frustrating for the eagles as the previous night would have given them confidence to go on and get revenge on the surrey lions.

a week passed and after a fantastic county championship victory against leaders northants, essex were back in t20 action down at canterbury. an average performance with the bat didnt give essex the best chance of victory and kent punished the eagles with captain key and mahmood both smashing their way to big scores. a convincing eight wicket win for the spitfires, made even more worrying to the essex fans due to the fixtures coming up. there would have to be a huge improvement if we were to progress from the position we were in.

the most 'winnable' of the upcoming games was a saturday early evening game at chelmsford, against the middlesex panthers. the panthers were already out of the race for a quarter final place so their role in the group was to upset some of the bigger teams and put the cat among the pigeons - and that is what they nearly did. with essex only putting 139 on the board, they put themselves in a vulnerable position. if the opposition had have been a better team, essex would have really been in trouble but a struggling middlesex side was one essex players felt that even a low score was good enough for them to defend. the match ended up being a lot more thrilling than essex really wanted - a vital six runs were added to middlesex's total due to essex's slow over rate, something that dismayed james foster. luckily essex just scraped through but it was clear for everyone to see that something needed to change. and fast.

now came the two tricky away games - somerset at bath and hampshire down at the rose bowl. somerset had thumped essex earlier on in the season and playing at a small ground with small boundaries seemed to suit somerset down to the ground, with the likes of trescothick, trego and buttler in the side. surprisingly the team who made the most of the small boundaries was essex. a staggering 81 from the previously out of form pettini and a timely return to form from ravi bopara saw essex set somerset 210 to win. it was evident that if trescothick got off to a good start, that target would be frequently shrinking. not many people though would have bet on him being bowled by phillips in the first over. after then, a few players tried to stage a comeback but with the required run rate ever increasing, the pressure got to the players and they crumbled - all out for 141. ryan ten doeschate's best bowling figures all season taking 3-18.

could essex make it two wins out of two? two nearly impossible wins? well no, we couldn't. it had rained all day and we were quite lucky to get a game underway at all. vince and ervine scored 55 and 45 respectively, hampshire reaching 151-7. essex's innings was a lot more rain affected due to regular rain showers, duckworth lewis came into play setting essex a new target of 132. essex ran them close but too few boundaries proved costly as they finished nine runs short.

the end was nigh and essex's penultimate game was at home to the glamorgan dragons. it really was a win-or-bust game, even though a win wouldn't do essex the world of good - we'd let outselves get behind the challengers for the third and fourth quarter final places. glamorgan were put into bat by stand-in captain pettini and got to 144. essex were obviously comfortable with the thought of reaching 145 - maybe a little too comfortable. there never seemed to be enough urgency to secure the necessary runs, taking 19 overs.

somehow, last night of t20 and essex were still in contention for a place in the quarters, with a little bit of help from the other games played in the week. surrey, sussex, kent and of course, essex all still needed to qualify. there was only a very small chance of essex winning and not qualifying, so they knew one good performance could see them through. a 69 from denly and a controversial 41 from stevens put more runs on the board than essex were expecting after quite a slow start from the spitfires.
even after a lot of suspect fielding from kent, essex failed to reach the 184 required and the uncharacteristically quiet county ground was filled with the celebrations of the kent players. stevens rightly winning man of the match after taking a wicket in each of his four overs. they deserved it and essex didn't bat well enough - simple as.