Evans steers Warwickshire across the line

Warwickshire 152 for 4 (Evans 68*) beat Northamptonshire 149 for 4 (White 60*) by six wickets
Scorecard

Laurie Evans swept Warwickshire to their first Friends Life t20 win of the season with a dominant unbeaten 68 that snatched victory from Northamptonshire's grasp at Edgbaston.

Evans has struggled to break into Warwickshire's first team since he arrived from Surrey but he has been given the opportunity to impress in this season's Twenty20 competition and seized it with a sparkling maiden half-century in the competition.

Evans revived Warwickshire after they had stumbled to 85 for 4 in pursuit of a target of 150 and decided the match in one decisive over from offspinner James Middlebrook. Evans swept Middlebrook for successive fours and then drove him through extra cover for a third to bring up a 34-ball 50.

He took two more fours off David Willey's next over, including the winning boundary through extra cover. Chris Woakes, released for county duty after he was left out of England's side for the one-day international against West Indies at The Oval, helped Evans to guide Warwickshire home with an over to spare by contributing 23 from 15 balls to an unbroken fifth-wicket stand of 67 in 37 balls.

Evans' match-winning innings helped him to atone for a lapse in the field which reprieved Cameron White when the former Australia Twenty20 captain had made only 3. Evans misjudged the chance at deep midwicket off Jeetan Patel and the ball cleared him after he ran in too far.

It looked like being a costly error as White, currently out of favour with Australia's selectors, followed up his unbeaten 47 in Sunday's defeat by Somerset with 60 not out from 39 balls. White struck sixes off Keith Barker and Darren Maddy and gave Northamptonshire's innings late acceleration after they had been pegged back by Patel and medium-pacer Steffan Piolet.

Niall O'Brien played a valuable supporting role to White in a third-wicket stand of 62 before he chopped on to Barker but White reached his 50 from 34 balls.

Warwickshire's acting captain Varun Chopra (25) and Darren Maddy contributed valuable cameos but it was Evans who completed the run chase with nine fours in his 41-ball innings.