T20 Blast: Michael Klinger steers Gloucestershire to victory at Essex

Gloucestershire hammered Essex by eight wickets in the Natwest T20 Blast, while the night's other two matches were both abandoned due to rain.

Michael Klinger was the man who did most of the damage at Chelmsford, smashing 78 from 49 balls as Gloucestershire eased to their 154 total in comfortable fashion to condemn the hosts to a fourth T20 defeat in five games.

The Australian opener rattled up two unbeaten T20 centuries against Essex last season, added a third in the LV= County Championship for good measure and steered his team to a third victory of the competition on Thursday night.

Alongside Hamish Marshall he put on 126 for the first wicket in 13.3 overs before the veteran pair departed in the space of four balls.

Marshall, who had earlier been dropped by wicketkeeper James Foster on one, was the first to go when he played on to Matt Quinn for 42 off 35 balls. And Klinger followed at the start of Wahab Riaz's first over when he edged through to Foster.

Klinger, who hit seven fours and four sixes. had earlier started Essex's agony when he won the toss on a slow track and scotched any hopes the home team might have had of another run chase by opting to bowl at them first.

Jesse Ryder went first ball and, although seven of the nine batsmen managed to get into double figures, none could go on to make a major contribution as wickets fell at regular intervals.

Tom Westley top-scored with a rapid 45 while Ravi Bopara hit two sixes in his 28, but no other player got beyond 17 as Gloucestershire kept things tight.

That put the visitors in pole position but it could have been a different story if the usually infallible Foster had managed to hang on to a chance high to his right when Marshall nicked Quinn at the start of Gloucestershire's run chase.

After that, New Zealander Marshall and Klinger took the game away from Essex before Ian Cockbain (15 not out) and Chris Dent (10no) eased Gloucestershire over the line with 19 balls to spare.

Meanwhile a big Lord's crowd of around 17,000 was left disappointed as Middlesex's South Group fixture against Sussex Sharks was abandoned due to persistent rain.

The match was the first of four floodlit T20 Blast games to be played by Middlesex at the home of cricket this season, but the frustrated spectators had no action to watch after rain set in soon after both teams had finished their pre-match warm-ups.

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Middlesex captain Dawid Malan had won the toss and chosen to bat first but the match was unable to get under way at its scheduled 6.15pm start time and the abandonment came at just after 8pm, with rain still falling.

And in the night's third scheduled match Lancashire's clash with Northamptonshire at Old Trafford, a repeat of last year's T20 Blast final, was also abandoned without a ball being bowled.

Heavy rain in Manchester saw the game called off just before 6.10pm with the outfield virtually flooded just an hour after the rain started to fall just after 4pm.