Charlie Allison stars again as Essex maintain flying form

Charlie Allison continued his sensational form with a personal best 74 to fire Essex to a fourth straight victory in the Vitality Blast men's competition and win the Battle of the Bridge.

Batter Allison battered his third half-century on the bounce, with Jordan Cox cracking 40 on his first Essex appearance of the summer, after IPL and England Lions duties.

Despite Sam Billings' 62 and some late hitting to bring the scores closer, Kent Spitfires' chase of 188 was never truly settled by Charlie Bennett's early wickets.

Prior to the Blast's two-and-a-half-week break, Kent is four points behind second-place Eagles in the South Group. After being stuck in, Essex had a slow start that was made worse by losing openers Michael Pepper and Paul Walter on the powerplay. If the returning Cox had also been given out, Essex could have been in serious trouble.

The former Kent keeper-batter had been unused by Royal Challengers Bengaluru and therefore a pair of England Lions outings over the last four days were his only competitive matches since February.

He quickly got into his work with a carved drive through point second ball before back-to-back forceful pulls proved he was not rusty. At the non-striker's end, Fred Klaassen thought he had run him out with his fingertip. Replays were inconclusive and TV umpire Rob White had no option but to give it not out - much to Billings' chagrin.

Cox had been on 17 when he survived that close shave, but he rebuilt with Allison in a 58-run partnership. But after Cox, for 40, and Luc Benkenstein fell in successive overs, but 21-year-old Allison took over with sixes galore.

He scored 67 runs with no outs and 61 runs in his final two innings with six maximums. With just three runs coming off his first four deliveries, Wiaan Mulder appeared to be chewing up balls.

However, he then exploded with boundaries, hitting 26 off his next six deliveries before being caught, giving Matt Milnes his third wicket in exemplary figures of 3 for 23. Essex reached par with 187 thanks to their 49-run partnership.

Bennett disallowed both openers because they were held behind the rate, and the Spitfires had a powerplay that was similar to the hosts'. Zak Crawley and Billings threatened to take the game away with a quickfire stand of 37 but Zum Akhter and Matt Critchley struck in back-to-back overs to put Essex in control.


Billings picked up his 41st T20 half-century but he and Chris Benjamin - the latter to a brilliant boundary juggle catch - fell within three balls of each other.

Things fizzled out for the visitors as Keith Dudgeon was the victim of a Simon Harmer direct hit, before Akhter - who picked up 3 for 19 - had Grant Stewart and Milnes caught in the same over. Jake Lintott and Klaassen threatened to make things nervy with a 34-run partnership for the last wicket but Essex held on.