Middlesex v Sussex: Scores & match report

Match scores

No result

Middlesex innings: 341-5 (Simpson 82, Stirling 71, Franklin 69, Higgins 48; Beer 1-48)

Sussex innings (4 overs): 26-1 (Nash 25 no)

Match report

Ryan Higgins' brilliant late hitting was ultimately in vain as Middlesex's Royal London One-Day Cup match with Sussex was washed out to a no-result at Lord's.

Higgins, who finished with 48 not out from 23 balls and scored 24 runs from a final over bowled by Ajmal Shahzad, propelled Middlesex to a challenging 50-over total of 341 for five.

Bad weather, however, arrived with Sussex 26 for one from four overs meaning the match was eventually declared a no-result with both teams taking a point.

Ireland international Paul Stirling’s 71 from 60 balls provided the initial impetus, before John Simpson (82 not out) and Middlesex captain James Franklin (69) steadied things following a mini-slide to 146 for four with a perfectly-paced century stand.

Stirling hit a six and nine fours and Adam Voges also scored a useful 40, but it was Franklin, in a 117-run partnership with Simpson in 16.4 overs, who began the late assault against Sussex’s bowlers by clubbing five sixes and three fours in his 69 from 60 balls.

Franklin and Simpson built their stand carefully at first as Sussex spinners Will Beer and Danny Briggs regained some sort of mid-innings control for their side in excellent 10-over spells.

But Franklin, who did swing leg spinner Beer for the first of his sixes, cut loose when the seamers returned for the last phase of the innings and took a heavy toll of Jofra Archer, David Wiese and Shahzad, who he pulled twice for sixes in the same over in which he was bowled aiming another big hit.

Simpson and Higgins, who flat-batted Wiese over cover and also straight-drove and pulled the suffering Shahzad for sixes in his explosive knock, hit out so strongly in the final overs that their unbroken stand of 78 took a mere 6.3 overs.

Higgins struck three fours off Shahzad as well as those two sixes in the eye-catching 50th over, and four fours in all, while Simpson included eight fours in his expertly-judged innings.

Sussex’s reply began with Chris Nash taking an immediate liking to Steven Finn, with two legside fours in an opening over costing 10 and then a pulled six and two further fours in Finn’s second over, which went for 14 runs.

In between, however, Tom Helm produced a fine outswinger with his first ball of the innings to have Luke Wright caught at the wicket for a first ball duck and the 22-year old England Lions fast bowler certainly impressed in the two overs he bowled at a cost of just one run – as well as the prized scalp of Wright – before the rain came.