Notts fall short despite Wood’s 29-ball fifty

Leicestershire 279 (Niall O’Brien 82, Pettini 50) beat Nottinghamshire 271 for 9 (Wood 52, Delport 2-43) by eight runsScorecard

Director of cricket Mick Newell castigated his top order after Nottinghamshire failed to chase down a target of 280 and left their chances of reaching the quarter-finals of the Royal London Cup depending on results elsewhere

“You have to look at the first 30 overs of our innings, not the last 20,” Newell said. “You have to look at the top six or seven batsmen, none made 50, that’s where the match was lost, and that’s really disappointing given the importance of the game.”

Needing 95 to win off the last ten overs, a brilliant half-century from debutant Luke Wood, made off just 29 balls, kept Notts in the hunt, but the young allrounder was yorked by Cameron Delport in the final over the match, leaving the last pair of Harry Gurney and Luke Fletcher too much to do.

“Luke had a fine game, and it’s good to have him available again after injury, but the senior players left him far too much to do,” Newell said. “Now we need to beat Worcestershire tomorrow and for other results to go our way.”

Leicestershire’s innings began badly after Mark Pettini won the toss and chosen to bat. The Foxes’ captain lost his opening partner to only the ninth ball of the innings, left-arm seamer Wood striking in his first over of his first List A match with a swinging delivery which found the edge of Paul Horton’s bat as the experienced former Lancashire man drove at the ball without real conviction.

Wood also picked up a wicket in his second over, another swinging delivery beating …

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