Middlesex's Max Holden also hammers Blast hundred but rain means six of the seven games end in no results
Friday 28 August 2020 16:16, UK
Keaton Jennings hit his first T20 hundred as Lancashire beat his former club Durham by 27 runs as the Vitality Blast got under way.
England batsman Jennings pounded 108 off 63 balls, an innings which featured 10 fours and three sixes, as he shared a Lancashire-record stand of 170 with opening partner Alex Davies (65 from 50 balls).
Durham vs Lancashire scorecard
Jennings, whose previous best T20 score was 88, smashed Mark Wood for one of his three sixes and also struck four fours in a row off Matty Potts.
Lancashire's 190-3 proved out of Durham's reach at Emirates Riverside, with the hosts only able to reply with 163-7 - Alex Lees top-scoring with 51 from 39 balls.
Max Holden's maiden T20 century could not help Middlesex beat Essex, though, with rain - which wrecked every fixture bar Durham vs Lancashire - ensuring the clash at Chelmsford ended in a no result.
Holden's 60-ball unbeaten 102 propelled Middlesex to 184-5 but the rain arrived with Essex 10-0 after 1.3 overs.
The rain also thwarted Kent - and England's Zak Crawley - as they seemed to be course for victory against Hampshire.
Kent, chasing 140 to win, were 52-0 after 4.1 overs and way ahead of the DLS requirement, only for the weather to force the players off with five more balls needed to constitute a game.
Crawley (22no off nine) - who scored 267 for England last week in the final Test against Pakistan - hit four of his nine balls for four as he and Daniel Bell-Drummond (28no off 16) got Kent off to a flyer.
Hampshire had been limited to 139-6, with Matt Milnes taking three wickets and Fred Klaassen two as well as a run out - Joe Weatherly top-scored for Hampshire with 68.
Gloucestershire's match against Northamptonshire was abandoned without a ball bowled due to rain having saturated the outfield in Bristol.
The same fate befell Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire at Emerald Headingley, Glamorgan and Worcestershire in Cardiff and Derbyshire and Leicestershire at Grace Road.
The Headingley rain-off meant Joe Root's return to county cricket was delayed, with the England Test captain having been poised to make his first Blast appearance for Yorkshire since July 2018.
Watch a Blast double header on Sky Sports Cricket on Monday. Leicestershire vs Durham is live from 1pm, with Derbyshire vs Lancashire then live from 6.30pm.
