It avoids the absurdity of a team challenging for the championship having to turn their attentions towards a major final after a motorway dash and a brief night's sleep. Success tomorrow would bring Warwickshire their sixth victory in the 60-over final and their third in the last five years.
Warwickshire, who completed an emphatic championship victory at Durham on Friday, were also beaten finalists two years ago, so last year's game, in which Essex, their opponents at Lord's tomorrow, came such an undignified cropper, appears almost to have been some mistake.
Supporters at Edgbaston in these boom years of the nineties have come to regard a visit to Lord's in the first weekend of September as something close to a right of membership and it is not insignificant that their players seem also to take the same view.
Two things alone, it seems, could give Essex a chance of wiping last year's extraordinary collapse against Lancashire from the memory: a century by Stuart Law or winning the toss and making the most of the notorious September dew. Their 57 all out batting second last season ended an extraordinary run of 10 matches in which batting first was the prelude to defeat. That this was a little freakish was demonstrated by Sussex's losing first-innings total of 321 in 1993. According to John Jameson, who oversees the care of the square at Lord's, the relaid pitch being used tomorrow will be more like the belter on that occasion than the cracked surface last year on which Glenn Chapple wreaked such havoc.
Imagine playing Allan Donald when the ball is swinging and seaming as it was then. That is not something Essex will wish to do. Their batting has lacked authority of late but that has had something to do with the absence of Ronnie Irani, who injured his side bowling in the semi-final against Glamorgan. He is back in the side and in Mark Ilott, Ashley Cowan and Peter Such, Essex have bowlers of quality who are capable of exploiting opportunities, ably supported by the left-arm spin of Paul Grayson. Cowan is tired after a busy season but with tour places in the offing has every incentive tomorrow.
Warwickshire, however, have the bowling superstar and if this is to be Donald's last big game for the county he has served with true devotion, he will wish to mark it in the proper way, despite a niggling ankle injury. Neither he nor the popular and respected old soldier, Gladstone Small, will take the new ball, which goes instead to Dougie Brown - for whom a winter tour is certain - and Graeme Welch.
If the pitch does play truly, their bowling to Law could be crucial. He may only have played one Test but he is a superb batsman and a big innings by him might make the match. Warwickshire expect to win trophies and despite the disruptions which have resulted from the season-long injury to Tim Munton normal service has been resumed; even to the extent that they will probably be able to replace Donald with Brian Lara again next year.
Neil Smith captains tomorrow, hoping to make it 13 victories in 14 one-day games since he took command and to emulate the achievement of his father, M J K, who led Warwickshire to success at Lord's in the 1966 Gillette Cup. Nick Knight, the official vice-captain, will be happy enough to concentrate on his batting and hope he will catch the eye of the England selection committee sufficiently to win himself a place on at least the A tour this winter. Andy Moles, like Munton, can only be a spectator, having suffered another injury to an Achilles' tendon, but he is assured, touch wood, of a successful benefit and the team have plenty of batting without him.
David Hemp, the former Glamorgan left-hander, has been man-of-the-match in the last two rounds, striking the ball with all the confidence and authority that earned him an A tour three years ago. Dominic Ostler has had his moments too, and Trevor Penney remains a double asset to his side, capable of quick runs or an accumulative innings if required and so marvellously predatory at backward point as to be, in effect, an all-rounder. It is, indeed, the all-round flexibility of Warwickshire which makes them the likely winners.
Warwickshire (probable): *Smith, Knight, Hemp, Ostler, Penney,
Brown, -Piper, Welch, Giles, Small, Donald.
Essex (from): *Prichard, S Law, Hussain, Irani, Robinson,
Grayson, D Law, -Rollins, Cowan, Ilott, Such, Williams.
Umpires: M Kitchen & P Willey.
Third umpire: J Hampshire.
Natwest Details
ESSEX
1st rd (Beaconsfield): bt Bucks by 89 runs.
2nd rd (Chelmsford): bt Worcs by 7 wkts.
Qtr-final (Trent Bridge): bt Notts by 3 wkts.
Semi-final (Chelmsford): bt Glamorgan by 1 wkt.
WARWICKSHIRE
1st rd (Edgbaston): bt Norfolk by 80 runs.
2nd rd (Edgbaston): bt Somerset by 11 runs.
Qtr-final (Lord's): bt Middlesex by 28 runs.
Semi-final (Edgbaston): bt Sussex by 105 runs.
PREVIOUS MEETINGS
1969 (Edgbaston, 2nd rd) Essex won by 7 wkts
1986 (Edgbaston, 2nd rd) Warwicks won by 64 runs.
PREVIOUS FINALS
Essex
1985 bt Notts by 1 run; '96 lost to Lancs by 129 runs.
Warwickshire
1964 lost to Sussex by 8 wkts; '66 bt Worcs by 5 wkts; '68 bt
Sussex by 4 wkts; '72 lost to Lancs by 4 wkts; '82 lost to
Surrey by 9 wkts; '89 bt Middlesex by 4 wkts; '93: bt Sussex by
5 wkts; '94 lost to Worcs by 8 wkts; '95 bt Northants by 4
wkts.
HIGHEST TOTALS
Essex: 386-5 v Wilts (Chelmsford '88).
Warwicks: 392-5 v (Oxfordshire (Edgbaston '84).
LOWEST TOTALS
Essex: 57 v Lancs (Lord's '96).
Warwicks: 109 v Kent (Canterbury '71).
HIGHEST INNINGS
Essex: 144 G A Gooch v Hants (Chelmsford '90).
Warwicks: 206 A I Kallicharran v Oxfordshire (Edgbaston '84).
BEST BOWLING
Essex: 5-8 J K Lever v Middlesex (Westcliff '72);
5-8 G A Gooch v Cheshire (Chester, '95).
Warwicks: 6-32 K Ibadulla v Hants (Edgbaston '65); 6-32 A I
Kallicharran v Oxfordshire (Edgbaston '84).