From The Archive: Notts Outlaws Knockout Matches

Hampshire’s first limited-overs match against Nottinghamshire was in the inaugural season the Sunday League in 1969, but it was two years later when we first played them in a knock-out cup match; a rather unusual 60-over Gillette Cup game at Portsmouth.

The game began on a damp Saturday when the visitor’s skipper, a useful all-rounder called Sobers, chose to bat and will have relaxed as the openers Harris & White - both ex-Middlesex - added 29, before Trevor Jesty struck. Then in no time Notts slipped to 35-3 before Sobers with 20 took them to 65 but wickets fell regularly to ‘Butch’ White, Jesty, Bob Cottam and John Rice while Peter Sainsbury bowled his 12 overs for just 22.

The weather intervened, frustrating the BBC television broadcast and Notts closed on 113-9, and although the two unrelated Taylors Mike and Bill added 16 on Sunday morning a target of 130 from 60 overs was not too daunting until Sobers whipped out the top three (Richards, Greenidge and Turner) with just six scored. Roy Marshall and Peter Sainsbury took them to 65 but at 79-5 Hampshire were not secure until Sobers with 12-6-11-4 completed his spell and Hampshire won by three wickets with five overs to spare.

In the following season, the two teams were drawn together again, this time at Trent Bridge and on a better day, again on television. Barry Richards opened with 55 and Jesty top-scored with 62* as Hampshire posted 283-9, while Mike Taylor’s figures 12-1-39-2 were impressive. Bolus and Harris opened with a half-century but then wickets fell regularly to John Rice and Notts slipped to 87-5.

Mike Taylor then made the one Notts half century (58) but Jesty with 4-32 took the match award as Hampshire won by 79 runs. Perhaps just as significantly Hampshire noted Mike Taylor’s contribution and when he was released by Notts, he moved south and in his first season made a major contribution to Hampshire’s last Championship triumph.

Given the strength of Nottinghamshire over the past 40 years it is perhaps surprising that they have never beaten Hampshire in a knock-out cup match of any duration, in a match based in either county. Their only success over Hampshire came in a T20 semi-final in 2017 but that was at Edgbaston against a Hampshire team that included Vince, Alsop, Dawson, Abbott, Crane and Wood.

I have written already about our two T20 quarter-finals against Notts at Trent Bridge, winning both of them in 2012 (when we won the trophy) and 2014. At other times, we beat them in a first round Gillette Cup match at Southampton in 1977 when chasing a target of 216 (Rice 4-37), Greenidge 106* and Richards 101* secured a ten-wicket victory.

In 1991 we met them for the first time in the B&H Cup and secured a much tighter victory after Chris Smith scored 121 in a total of 264-5. Notts got very close (Robinson 54, Udal 3-48) but lost by four runs in the season when we won the other knock-out competition, by then sponsored by Nat West.

We achieved that by beating Notts for a second time in the same season when despite 95 from Derek Randall, we reached our target of 253 (Cardigan Connor 3-42) despite the controversial run-out of an impeded Paul Terry, as Chris Smith scored another century and shared a partnership of 114 with his ‘little’ brother. That was the last time we met them in a long-form knock-out match although there have been two recent group games. Otherwise in this century it has been those three T20 games – here’s hoping for a third victory this year!