T20 Blast: Ravi Bopara inspires Essex win over Glamorgan

Colin Ingram hit four sixes in his innings of 70 for Glamorgan

A superb all-round performance by Ravi Bopara steered Essex to victory over Glamorgan at Chelmsford.

Bopara steadied Essex with a calm 52 after Tom Westley (19), Jesse Ryder (19) and Mark Pettini fell early on.

And Graham Napier's extraordinary innings of 27 off only seven balls lifted Essex to a daunting 187-7.

Then Bopara took 3-25 in four overs as Glamorgan were dismissed for 171 in spite of Colin Ingram's battling innings of 70.

The England international all-rounder was also man-of-the-match when Essex won by five wickets in Cardiff on 22 May.

Although it was Bopara's consistency that guided Essex to victory, it was Napier who swung the momentum of the match in the home team's favour.

Tom Westley fell for 19 to the bowling of Glamorgan's Michael Hogan

He hammered four sixes in the 19th over of the Essex innings off the bowling of Graham Wagg.

Glamorgan's reply got off to a disastrous start with Craig Mechede falling for a duck to Reece Topley in the first over, and only three runs scored in the first two.

Wagg clattered 41 off 19 balls to help Glamorgan get back on track, but the Welsh county were always chasing the game after Shaun Tait claimed two wickets in the 13th over.

The defeat ended a run of six consecutive wins in all forms of the game for Glamorgan, and lifted Essex into third place in the South Group table.

Essex: Pettini, Ryder, Westley, Bopara, ten Doeschate (capt), Browne, Foster, Napier, Masters, Tait, Topley.

Glamorgan: Rudolph (capt), Meschede, Ingram, Cooke, Wright, Wagg, Wallace, Parnell, Cosker, Hogan, Lloyd.