IT'S all or nothing for Yorkshire Phoenix who meet Leicestershire Foxes tonight under the Grace Road floodlights in the totesport League (4pm).

Having been saved from almost certain defeat by the weather on Monday, when they finished up splitting the points with Nottinghamshire, Yorkshire now need to win all of their last three games if they are to stand any chance of promotion.

And today's encounter is a particularly tough one because Leicestershire are in exactly the same boat as Yorkshire - four points behind the third promotion place which three games to play.

"Whichever side wins will still have a shout of making the First Division next season but the losers will slip out of the race," said Yorkshire captain Matthew Wood.

"We will be going flat out for victory but even if we come through we will still have to go on winning."

Yorkshire then play Derbyshire Scorpions at Derby on August 29 and everything could hinge on their last match at Scarborough on September 5, which is against Durham Dynamos who are currently in third spot.

Yorkshire have won only one of their last six totesport League games and on this form their chances of going up are extremely slim but even if they miss out it is vitally important that they finish in either fourth or fifth place.

The reason is that the bottom four counties - not including Scotland - in the Second Division of the totesport League will be drawn against each other in the first full round of next season's Cheltenham and Gloucester Trophy.

The remaining 14 counties will all have matches with non-first class opposition, making it much easier for them to progress to the next round of the competition.

Darren Lehmann and Ian Harvey both say farewell to Yorkshire after today's match when they will join up with Australia for a one-day tournament in Amsterdam before next month's ICC Champions' Trophy.

But fellow countryman Phil Jaques rejoined Yorkshire on Sunday and will play for them in the Championship match with Leicestershire which starts at Grace Road tomorrow.

Because today's game is not scheduled to finish until around 10.20pm, play will begin tomorrow at 11.30am and on Friday at 10.45am.

Yorkshire Phoenix: Wood, Harvey, Gale, Lehmann, McGrath, Craven, Dawson, Dawood, Bresnan, Kirby, Blain.

Updated: 11:06 Wednesday, August 18, 2004