T20 Blast: Wins for Rapids, Yorkshire, Middlesex and Essex

Leg-spinner Jafer Chohan produced the third-best bowling figures in Yorkshire’s T20 history to help them beat Durham and keep their hopes of qualifying for the Blast alive.

Elsewhere, Worcestershire, Middlesex and Essex won, while Derbyshire’s game against Lancashire was abandoned without a ball being thrown due to rain.

Londoner Chohan, who turned 22, ran out 5-14 victors after Vikings captain Shan Masood made it clear they needed to win their last four games to have any chance of securing a top-four spot in the North Group.

The quality of Chohan’s performance was underlined by the fact that of his five victims, two were bowled, one leg-before, one stumped and one caught behind.

Yorkshire reduced Durham to 40-5, although Ashton Turner (16) and Ben Raine (33) combined for half-centuries before Chohan worked his magic to remove Raine and finish the innings on 107.

Adam Lyth (30) and Dawid Malan (29) made it a seven-wicket walk ahead of the Roses derby against Lancashire at Old Trafford on Friday.

In the South Group, Tawanda Muyeye’s brilliant 73 from 40 balls was not enough to save Kent after Essex had posted a 187-3 score at Chelmsford.

The home side started well as Adam Rossington (36) and Dean Elgar (33) added 50 runs from the first six overs and after Paul Walter (46*) and Matt Critchley (31*) went wild – including 17 runs from an over by Nathan Gilchrist – Kent were left with a tough chase.

Muyeye led the Essex attack with gusto as South African Eathan Bosch scored 24 runs from an over and Marcus O’Riordan at the other end added 33 runs from 17 overs, but Shane Snater (2-25) managed to stop both runs with catches off his own bowling.

With Simon Harmer (1-20) and Sam Cook (1-25) hitting the brakes, Kent fell 22 runs short at 165-5.

A century-long partnership between Jack Davies and Martin Andersson laid the foundations for only Middlesex’s second win of the T20 season, dashing Gloucestershire’s hopes of a top-four finish and a quarter-final place.

Middlesex are bottom of the South Group and it looked like their game against Cheltenham College would go the same way as they went down to 32-4.

Davies (53 from 35 balls) and Andersson (52 from 39) rebuilt the match, with Gloucester stalwart David Payne catching both and adding three more wickets of his own, before Josh de Caires scored 31 from 16 balls in the closing stages to post an impressive 181-8.

Captain Jack Taylor did his best to get Gloucestershire on track, with three sixes and four fours in his 45, but Luke Hollman’s 3-37 ripped the heart out of the top of the order and secured a 29-run victory.

Matthew Waite recorded a personal best of 5-21 to give Worcestershire, the worst team in the North Group, a morale-boosting victory in a thrilling battle against top-four Leicestershire.

New Zealand international Jimmy Neesham took his first wicket for the Foxes, but Kashif Ali’s rapid-fire 41 and Adam Hose’s 63, including two sixes and six fours, took the home side to an impressive total of 184-8 at New Road.

Leicestershire’s match started poorly as Harry Darley (2-11), a product of the Pears academy who was bowled out for 36 by Lancashire on his debut last weekend, took the wickets of England’s Rehan Ahmed and captain Peter Handscomb in three balls to put them 22-4.

Louis Kimber (53) opened the innings with five sixes in seven balls, former Rapids keeper Ben Cox added 55 and Scott Currie’s powerful knock brought in 20 runs from the penultimate over.

But Waite removed Cox and Currie in a brilliant last over to leave Leicestershire all out for 168.

Lancashire and Derbyshire are both in the running for qualification from the North Group, but they were thwarted by persistent rain in Derby, forcing the team to retire without a ball having been thrown.

Chester-le-Street: Durham v Notts Outlaws

Leicester: Leicestershire Foxes v Northants Steelbacks

Edgbaston: Birmingham Bears v Worcestershire Rapids

Old Trafford: Lancashire Lightning v Yorkshire Vikings (19:00)

Cardiff: Glamorgan v Middlesex

Canterbury: Kent Spitfires v Middlesex

Taunton: Somerset v Surrey

Southampton: Hampshire Hawks v Gloucestershire (19:00)

Unless otherwise stated, play starts at 18:30 BST