Cricket / NatWest Trophy Semi-Finals: Agnew on right wavelength: Northants poised for Lord's as Essex fight to justify favouritism

Essex . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .188-6

Leicestershire

THE BBC's cricket correspondent left the field looking more in need of a visit to an oxygen tent than the sponsor's tent, but as comebacks go, it was more than Jonathan Agnew could have dared hope for. England's squad for the last three Texaco Trophy matches is due out on Sunday, and when he gets his breath back, he will probably be on the radio demanding to be in it.

Leicestershire's passage into their first 60-over Lord's cup final is still in the balance - rain having delayed yesterday's start until 4.30 - but it will be no fault of Agnew's if they fail to make it. He bowled his quota of overs straight through, on the not unreasonable premise that anything else might have required the services of a crane to get him back to the crease, and after a two-year absence from the game, an analysis of 12-2-31-1 - without conceding a boundary - was a fine achievement.

However, it also has to be said that he could scarcely have asked for a more accommodating pitch, which was oozing moisture when the covers were finally rolled back, and Essex's total of 188 for 6 from 52 overs demonstrated precisely why Leicestershire were prepared to exacerbate their annual trading loss on phone calls to Agnew.

Without the injured David Millns and Vince Wells, their bowling cupboard is horribly bare, and their fifth bowler combination of Laurie Potter and Justin Benson allowed Essex to regain much of the ground they had lost early on. If they can press on this morning to around 230, they might even be slight favourites.

A desperately slow outfield made it an even more important toss for Nigel Briers to have won, and with Winston Benjamin and Alan Mullally making the ball deviate extravagantly at times, Essex's early batsmen regarded it as an achievement to make contact never mind score runs.

Mullally's opening delivery removed John Stephenson for a first- ball duck, Stephenson edging to slip as he attempted to remove the bat, and the prized scalp of Graham Gooch followed in Benjamin's fourth over when the England captain got an edge attempting a forcing shot off the back foot. Benson, who is in the Graeme Hick class of slip catchers, gobbled this one up as well.

Agnew came on at 36 for 2 from 13 overs, and had Jonathan Lewis propelled his first delivery - a gentle half-volley - for four, rather than drill it straight at Benjamin in the covers, it might not have done Agnew's confidence too much good. However, by the time he was into his fourth over, Agnew had conceded only three singles, and when he then tempted Lewis into having a go at a wide one, the wicketkeeper, Paul Nixon, took a smart catch low to his right.

Agnew continued to bowl tightly, although as each over passed the walk back to third man became progressively more weary, and the swigs from his drinking bottle ever more frequent. As his normal tipple now is gin and tonic, interspersed with the occasional small cigar, this was hardly surprising.

Gordon Parsons bowled pretty well in tandem with Agnew, but Essex are not the sort of opposition to keel over in a crisis, and Paul Prichard and Nasser Hussain declined to panic when the half-way point of the innings arrived with a grim-looking 66 for 3 on the scoreboard. These two accelerated against Potter and Benson, and had put on 112 in 27 overs before Hussain was bowled giving Parsons the charge. Losing Prichard (87 from 136 balls) just before the close was a blow, but Essex's cause remains far from lost.

(Photograph omitted)