Familiar foes meet on Finals Day

Three of the four teams who contested Finals Day in 2014 will meet again later this month to determine the winner of the NatWest T20 Blast. Birmingham, the defending champions, will be joined by Lancashire, last year's losing finalists, and two-time winners Hampshire.

The fourth county are 2013 winners Northamptonshire. They have been drawn against Birmingham in the first semi-final, which will start at 11am on August 29. As in 2014, Lancashire will face Hampshire in the second semi-final at 2.30pm.

"Hopefully it will be the same result in the semi, and we can go one better this year and win the final," Steven Croft, Lancashire's captain, said after his team squeezed past Kent on Saturday, by virtue of losing fewer wickets in their tie.

Birmingham are favourites to become the first team to retain the trophy and they will be playing on their home ground, with Edgbaston hosting Finals Day for the third year running. They topped the North Group, ahead of Northamptonshire and Lancashire - third and fourth respectively - while Hampshire finished third in the South Group.

Hampshire will be making a sixth consecutive Finals Day appearance, extending their own record, and looking to win for the first time since 2012. Lancashire have won more T20 games than any other county since the format's introduction but are still searching for a first title.

The only other time the same three teams have reached consecutive Finals Days was in 2005, when Leicestershire, Lancashire and Surrey all made it back, only for Somerset to lift what was then the Twenty20 Cup.