Warwickshire progress to quarter-finals

Warwickshire 145 for 8 beat Yorkshire 131 by 14 runs
Scorecard

Warwickshire confirmed their place in the Friends Provident t20 quarter-finals with a hard-fought 14-run victory over Yorkshire at Edgbaston. A target of 146 proved too much for the visitors as Keith Barker finished the match with a hat-trick in the last over. Richard Pyrah and Clint McKay were both caught by Rikki Clarke at long-off before the left-arm paceman bowled David Wainwright.

While Barker applied an emphatic finishing touch in dismissing Yorkshire for 131, the hard work was done by spin pair Imran Tahir and Ant Botha, who put the squeeze on the middle order by sharing four wickets at cost of 35 runs in eight overs.

Although a key dismissal was credited to a seamer when Steffan Piolet forced Adam Lyth (31) to tread on his stumps, it was Tahir who delivered a major blow when he bowled Jacques Rudolph for 27. The legspinner also removed Jonathan Bairstow with a slick stumping by Tim Ambrose and when Gerard Brophy and Adil Rashid fell in successive overs from Botha, there was no way back for Yorkshire.

Australian all-rounder McKay did his best with sixes off Piolet and Neil Carter but his 20 off 12 balls was not enough to prevent his side's eighth defeat in 14 games. Even if they win their last two games against Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, they may be hard-pressed to qualify from the North Group.

Bold hitting by lower-order all-rounders gave Warwickshire a workable total after crashing to 97 for 7 with only 25 balls remaining. Clarke, fresh from a defiant Championship century at Headingley, again targeted Yorkshire's bowlers with three fours and two sixes from 29 balls in making 39, his highest in the competition this season.

When he was out, swinging a catch to short fine leg off McKay, Chris Woakes made the most of the final over, carting Richard Pyrah for two sixes in an unbeaten 27 from only a dozen deliveries.

Yorkshire were completely in charge of the middle phase once Wainwright, with three for 32 in his first Twenty20 game of the summer, and Steven Patterson (three for 25) had broken a brisk opening stand by Jonathan Trott (19) and Carter (27).

Trott's first innings since his maiden one-day international century for England ended with a mistimed chip back to left-arm spinner Wainwright, who went on to remove Darren Maddy and Keith Barker in his third over.