Yorkshire Cricket by David Warner

Yorkshire made a mockery of their position at the top of the AXA League table when they were skittled out for 93 by Leicestershire at Headingley yesterday and went on to suffer a crushing defeat by eight wickets with 17.4 overs remaining, the game being all over by six o'clock.

Even though Yorkshire were without their star Australian batsman, Darren Lehmann, whose back was still sore after an injection, there was little excuse for this poor showing, and they will have to get grip of themselves tomorrow if they are to beat Essex in the semi-final of the Benson and Hedges Cup.

Yorkshire simply could not cope with a seaming pitch upon which all of the opposition bowlers performed extremely well and they just managed to get above their lowest 40-overs score against Leicestershire of 89 for nine, made at Grace Road in 1989.

The pitch, another Headingley shocker for a one-day match, eased out to some extent when Leicestershire batted but Phil Simmons and Vince Wells attacked from the start with a 53 opening stand in only 11 overs to put the issue beyond doubt.

It turned out to be a bad omen when David Byas called correctly for the first time and continued Yorkshire's seven-match sequence from the start of the season of batting first.

Within a dozen overs, the first half of the batting had been swept aside for only 25 by James Ormond, a young fast bowler with the physique and a passing resemblance to Fred Trueman, assisted by Chris Lewis and Wells.

First to go was Matthew Wood for a duck on his Sunday debut after receiving a lethal ball from Ormond which seamed away to touch the edge, and Byas followed to a well judged boundary catch by Ormond at third man when he top-edged a hook at Lewis.

Craig White, Michael Vaughan and Anthony McGrath all failed miserably to avoid contact with slow seamers and it was left to Richard Blakey, coming in at No 7, to save Yorkshire from complete humiliation.

Bradley Parker stayed with him for a while until cutting Wells to backward point after helping to more than double the score and there was further resistance from Gavin Hamilton, who hit two boundaries and ran a four before looking aghast to be given lbw by umpire Ray Julian pushing forward.

Blakey had survived for 71 balls for his 29 with two boundaries when he attempted to cut Lewis and was well caught at slip by Simmons, and the tail was polished off by Dominic Wilson, Paul Hutchison being last out after defying Leicestershire for 29 deliveries while making a single.

Williamson just failed to take a hat-trick, getting rid of Hamilton and Silverwood with consecutive balls and then seeing Blakey's cut land a fraction short of Simmons's hands at backward point.

Simmons and Wells attacked from the start for Leicestershire with Wells hammering a four in Silverwood's first over, which gave away a costly ten runs and, with Hutchison also unable to find the right spot, 26 were on the board from five overs when White and Hamilton took over.

But Wells helped himself to a couple of boundaries off each bowler with a combination of lucky edges and sumptuous cover drives and he had slammed 38 off 37 balls with five fours when he helped a ball from Hamilton into Blakey's gloves.

Simmons drove Silverwood's first ball of a new spell to mid-off to make it 60 for two and even though Yorkshire's bowling tightened up for a while it was too late to worry either Ben Smith or Lewis, who hit Hutchison high over mid-wicket for six on his way to an unbeaten 27 from 22 balls with four fours.

Yorkshire's championship match against Leicestershire ended in a draw at Headingley on Saturday when rain wiped out play on the final day - as it had done on the first. Yorkshire gained nine points from the game and their opponents eight.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.