Yorkshire were left with little option but to field and unchanged side in their PPP Championship match against Essex at Chelmsford today, despite losing by five wickets to Middlesex at Headingley on Monday.

Darren Gough and Gavin Hamilton remain very much involved with the World Cup, Paul Hutchison is still only at the start of his fight for match fitness following a back injury, and Richard Harden will see a specialist next week for a report on how his damaged hand is progressing.

With the entire four days of last week's second team Roses match wiped out by the weather at Middleton, Yorkshire were reluctant to take one of their key young players to Chelmsford only for him to miss out on selection and then be faced with another week without cricket.

So it was a full-strength second team which was taking on Essex Seconds in the four-day game that was beginning at Harrogate today while that club's Vic Craven travelled to Chelmsford as 12th man.

Although Yorkshire fought tooth and nail against Middlesex, only to be outgunned in the end by great batting from Australian Justin Langer and Paul Weekes, they have now lost two of their three championship matches and have plunged to a worrying 13th in the table.

Essex, however, are only one point and one place above them, and Yorkshire are looking for victory against last year's wooden spoonists in order to lift themselves out of the bottom nine who will form next season's Second Division when the championship splits into two parts.

Yorkshire need to bat much better than they did in the first innings against Middlesex when no-one offered captain David Byas any real support, but Anthony McGrath has had his confidence boosted by his career-best 142 not out in the second innings.

Chris Silverwood should also be full of beans after Langer described him as among the fastest bowlers he has ever faced - and that includes Pakistan's young tearaway, Shoaib Akhtar.

Silverwood missed the first match as a precautionary measure following a neck problem but in the next two games he collected 11 victims to become Yorkshire's leading wicket-taker.

In the second team match, James Middlebrook returns after severely dislocating his finger while fielding substitute for Yorkshire against Gloucestershire at Headingley.

Gary Fellows also plays and after the game will dash down to Chelmsford to join Yorkshire for their CGU National League encounter with Essex on Sunday.

Meanwhile, former Yorkshire and Somerset off-spinner Jeremy Batty was playing for the Yorkshire County Board team today in their NatWest Trophy second round game against Minor Counties' side Buckinghamshire at Abbeydale Park, Sheffield. If the

YCB win their prize will be a home tie against Warwickshire at Harrogate in the third round on June 23.

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