Yorkshire withstand Salisbury's spell

NATWEST TROPHY QUARTER-FINALS: Home side poised to join Essex, Lancashire and Yorkshire in final four

Sussex 212-9 Yorkshire 215-5 Yorkshire win by five wickets

It was not until Yorkshire were more than halfway through their 60 overs, needing 57 more to win with eight wickets standing, that they allowed Sussex even a glimmer of hope. An outstanding spell of leg spin bowling by Ian Salisbury unsettled the Yorkshiremen's composure and at 176 for five Sussex will have felt they just had an outside chance.

But Salisbury had finished his 12 overs with the scant reward of one for 33 and Jason Lewry, who also looked dangerous, had only four left. No more wickets fell and Craig White and Richard Blakey took Yorkshire to their second semi-final this year with 12.3 overs to spare.

Yorkshire had soon lost Michael Vaughan, caught behind driving off the back foot, before Martyn Moxon and David Byas added 99 comfortable runs in 20 overs. Byas was then bowled off his pad trying to play a leg break through midwicket.

Michael Bevan helped Moxon to take the score to 156 in the 32nd over when Moxon came firmly forward to Lewry, who gets a lot of power in his delivery stride from his broad shoulders, and was caught behind. At 170, Anthony McGrath tried to turn a long hop from Vasbert Drakes to leg and lobbed a catch off the back of the bat to gully.

Six runs later, Salisbury began his last over, and White ran the fifth ball to short third man. Bevan called for the single and was run out by the narrowest of margins by Lewry's direct hit, but that was as far as Sussex could get.

When Alan Wells won the toss, he surprisingly decided to bat on a pitch which had a slight tinge of green about it. It was also overcast and felt a good morning to bowl. As it was, Bill Athey, playing against his home county, and Jamie Hall put on 85 for the first wicket in 26 overs.

It was too slow a start and as they tried to quicken the pace against some very steady bowling, Sussex subsided from 102 for one to 139 for 8 in 16 overs. Only some robust strokes from Paul Jarvis, another Yorkshire exile, took them past 200.

It was not enough to stop Yorkshire gaining revenge for their 22-run defeat when they last played at Hove in this competition way back in 1963 - its very first year.