MATCH PREVIEW: Essex Women vs Lancashire Thunder , Vitality Blast Women
Essex v Lancashire Thunder
Vitality Blast
Wednesday July 16, 2025, 6pm
The Ambassador Cruise Line County Ground, Chelmsford
England fast bowler Mahika Gaur has some big international assignments on the horizon in the next 12 months, but the left-armer has her eyes firmly fixed on achieving success with Lancashire before this summer is concluded.
Gaur, aged 19, was back in county colours on Sunday - for the first time since last May.
With guidance from the England management, she has had her workloads managed following a long-standing side injury.
She returned figures of 0-16 from three overs having taken the new ball in the Vitality Blast defeat against Durham at Emirates Old Trafford.
Unfortunately, it was a loss which ended Lancashire’s chances of success in that competition, and their last two games this week will be dead rubbers as a result.
The first of those is against Essex at the Ambassador Cruise Line Ground, Chelmsford on Wednesday evening (6pm). Both teams are out of contention.
The good news, though, is that Gaur and co are still on course for a season’s double.
Having tasted success in the early-season Vitality County T20 Cup knockout competition, they are in excellent shape in the 50-over Metro Bank One-Day Cup competition, which resumes at the back end of this month.
They are second in that table having won six of eight matches. With six more to play between now and mid-September, they are firmly on course for the semi-finals.
During the first half of the summer, Gaur took six wickets in five matches in that competition. She didn’t play at all in the County T20 Cup triumph and has only twice in the ongoing Blast.
“Seeing them win the County Cup was obviously very nice, but it’s just made me want to be part of the team even more,” said the talented teenager.
“I want to be winning trophies with Lancashire.
“I’m excited to play a role in helping them win again over the next few months.
“It’s so good to finally see it coming together and us starting winning.
“Last season, and the season before that, we felt like we were playing really good cricket, but it wasn’t working out and we weren’t winning.
“Now, it’s nice to see that the hard work we’ve done over the past few years, we’re getting rewarded.”
Lancashire will play Durham at the Banks Homes Riverside and Essex at Sedbergh in 50-over cricket on July 24 and 30.
Before that, however, they must complete their Blast duties, with two games this week.
Thunder head into Wednesday’s Essex clash bidding for their seventh win in 13 games.
Unfortunately, their two-wicket defeat against Durham at Emirates Old Trafford on Sunday, with the visitors successfully chasing 149, was their sixth defeat of the campaign and knocked them out of contention.
Gaur and co are 11 points behind the third-placed Bears with only 10 to play for.
Surrey, The Blaze and the Bears will all contest Finals Day at the Kia Oval on Sunday July 27.
The Red Rose face the bottom two sides in the group this week. Essex sit second-bottom ahead of Somerset.
The Chelmsford county have won three and lost eight from 12 this campaign and were beaten by Thunder by eight wickets on DLS in a rain-affected clash at Emirates Old Trafford at the start of the month.
Opposition player to watch
Wicketkeeper-opener Lauren Winfield-Hill is Essex’s leading run-scorer in this competition, with 334 from 12 matches, including a best of 69.
Winfield-Hill is on loan at Chelmsford purely for this competition, from Tier 2 side Yorkshire.
The former England World Cup winner, aged 34, signed a four-year contract at Headingley and has been appointed their captain. But part of the agreement was that while Yorkshire were in Tier 2 for this season only, she would go out on loan for this competition to play Tier 1 cricket ahead of the Hundred.
She will play for the Oval Invincibles in that competition.
Winfield-Hill is a dynamic batter who has the ability to take the game away in a flash.
She is in the top five run-scorers in the competition, just two runs shy of Thunder opener Emma Lamb.
Winfield-Hill, playing for Yorkshire, was also the leading run-scorer with 176 in the early-season Vitality County T20 Cup competition, which Lancashire won.
How’s Stat!
Opener Emma Lamb will not be available for Lancashire’s last two Blast games having linked up with England’s ODI squad for their series against India.
But, in scoring 74 off 48 balls in defeat against Durham on Sunday, she topped 1,000 runs for the season in all cricket.
In T20 and 50-over cricket, she has totalled 1,033 runs in 20 matches.
That’s broken down into 336 runs in eight Blast innings, 120 in four in the County T20 Cup and 577 in eight innings in the Metro Bank One-Day Cup.
Helped by more competitions and more matches, but she is the first player for any county or regional side to achieve that feat since professional domestic cricket was first played in England in 2016.