Pepper adds the spice in enterprising Essex's title charge

There are three things that it is worth knowing about Essex's 2023 Vitality Blast campaign. The first is that they squeezed through to the quarter-finals with their last hit of the group stage, as Feroze Khushi's cow-corner slog was carried over the rope by Chris Jordan to secure a three-wicket win against Surrey. Even then, progress wasn't confirmed until Kent lost at Somerset later that night.

The second and third are linked, and tell you a bit about that dramatic finish at The Oval. No team has gone harder from the start of their batting innings than Essex, a powerplay run rate of 10.30 more than half a run per over above the next team on the list. And similarly, no team has lost more wickets in this year's Blast. You can land your punches but Essex just keep coming.

It may not the perfect strategy, but it clearly suits a group of cavalier young players balanced out by a few senior heads. In that Surrey game, for instance, Essex lost a wicket from the second ball of their chase of 196, then freewheeled along at more than 12 an over until the departure of Dan Lawrence in the 12th; from which point they lost 6 for 48 to put the result back into the balance right up until Khushi's finisher.

Leading the way in a line-up that clearly likes to buckle its swash is Michael Pepper, who powered the Oval chase alongside Lawrence with 75 off 39 balls. A 25-year-old who styles himself on AB de Villiers and speaks with a similar, though less-pronounced, twang - Pepper was born in the UK to an English father and South African mother - he has been Essex's leading run-scorer in each of the last three editions of the Blast. Over the last two summers, he has 830 T20 runs at a strike rate of 168.35. Only one player has scored as heavily at a quicker rate - Somerset's Will Smeed (900 at 169.17).

"It's definitely fearless cricket, just trying to take the game on as much as you can," Pepper tells ESPNcricinfo. "Always looking to be positive and trust your instincts when you are out there, and it's definitely helped by our batting line-up batting so deep. Literally anyone in almost the top nine or 10 can win you the game from a lot of different positions. So the fact that we have just that depth the whole way down [means] we can continue being aggressive and that's definitely our mantra, of trying to take the game on as much as we can."

In fact, according to Daniel Sams, the Australia allrounder who is one of those match-winners down the order - and currently the most valuable player in the competition according to ESPNcricinfo's Smart Stats - Essex have tried to dismantle one of T20's most-established axioms: if you lose three wickets in the powerplay, you are likely to lose the game.

"We have lost three wickets in six overs probably more than once this tournament but I'm pretty sure at least one of those games, after six overs we were still going at tens and we still won the game," Sams says. "So I think that mentality of old - lost a few wickets and we need to hold back - doesn't really work anyway. The buy in is, 'Let's just be bold, let's be brave and just keep doing what we would do, regardless of the situation.' Because all the situations or scenarios, that's just a distraction from how you can best play your game."

As befits a team that prizes strike rate above average, Essex have been three down in the powerplay six times this season, and won three of them - including a rocky start of 31 for 4 in 4.2 overs chasing 151 at Canterbury (victory achieved with four wickets and 10 balls to spare).

It is four years since Essex won their maiden T20 title with a team, again led by Simon Harmer, featuring club greats Ryan ten Doeschate and Ravi Bopara. Pepper was an unused squad member for Finals Day in 2019 but is now foremost among a clutch of players aged 22-25 - including Khushi, Robin Das and Will Buttleman - who are looking to repeat the feat. Lawrence, 26, who starred in the quarter-final win over Birmingham and is in his last season for the club having agreed a move to Surrey, will also be key, although Khushi has been ruled out of involvement due to a fractured hand.

Pepper has already had a taste of the franchise world that is opening up for short-format cricketers, playing in the Hundred and Abu Dhabi T10. But he has not contemplated taking the route Smeed opted for in signing a white-ball-only contract with Somerset and hopes to attract the interest of England - and perhaps one day the IPL - through the established pathways.

"I don't like tipping myself as just a T20 player," Pepper says. "I'm still trying to get in all the Essex teams. I've still got quite a heavy focus on four-day cricket, but it [T20] just seemed to be the one that's come the most natural to me - [where I've] just excelled, being able to go out and express myself, playing on natural feel."

It is also the format where he is most confident in his using wide range of sweeps, reverse-sweeps and ramps, learnt in part through playing hockey growing up, to manipulate bowlers to his advantage. "I've always enjoyed trying to get the field set to how I want it, trying to have a man up where I would like him and then there's always part of the ground that I'm able to access. Then trying to get various angles and gaps in the field I can then target. [It's] definitely very enjoyable and quite a pleasing result when it comes off for you.

"That's probably where the sweeps and ramps and reverses [come in], then get men put in those areas and obviously if they're back it allows a lot of access and gaps for almost normal or conventional cricket shots."

It is the unorthodox stuff that catches the eye, though - such as a brutal reverse-sweep for six off Sunil Narine against Surrey. "Not many people in the world play the way that he plays with some of the shots that he does," Sams says. "Playing all his tricks, reverse-sweeps and stuff like that, they're just [like] a normal forward defence."

Essex will return to Edgbaston on Saturday hoping that Pepper's pep can spice up their challenge in the first semi-final against Hampshire. They lost twice to the reigning champions in the group stage, including being bowled out for 96 chasing 215, but the approach is bound to be the same: go big, or go home early.