DURHAM are hoping Nathan Astle will be fit to bowl in tonight's Twenty20 match against Yorkshire at Headingley after he was off the field for most of Nottinghamshire's innings on Tuesday.

The New Zealander had two stitches in his right hand after splitting the webbing between two fingers but it did not inconvenience him as he launched Durham's winning reply with 64 off 43 balls.

"We will have to protect him in the field a bit but he should be able to bowl," said coach Martyn Moxon, adding: "We will have to look after him with one eye on the championship match against Lancashire on Friday week."

The same applies to Ashley Noffke and Mark Davies, who will play no part in the Twenty20, despite Liam Plunkett's struggles since his injury.

"It's not unexpected with Liam," said Moxon. "When he has been out it takes him a while to get his rhythm back but I'm sure it will come. We will see how he goes against Yorkshire and if we think he needs to play in a longer match we'll give him a second-team game."

Davies is to play in the A-team games against Yorkshire at Sunderland today and Lancashire at Unsworth on Monday, while Noffke is working on his core strength to avoid a repeat of his back trouble.

Gordon Muchall's unbeaten 64 on Tuesday meant both he and Astle equalled the highest score by a Durham player in the competition, made by Phil Mustard at Trent Bridge last year.

In three Twenty20 matches this season Muchall now has 148 runs for once out and fully justified his promotion to No 3 on Tuesday.

Moxon said: "He has scored at better than a run-a-ball in each innings without taking many risks. If you look at the teams who have scored big totals someone has always got 50-plus. You need to spend time at the crease for that and we want to give Gordon that so he can knock it around for a while then unleash his big shots.

"Also, we want Phil Mustard in, ideally with ten overs to go. We don't want him to fall into the trap of thinking he has plenty of time so he needn't go for his shots."

Durham: D M Benkenstein (capt), N J Astle, N Peng, G J Muchall, P Mustard, G J Pratt, G R Breese, G M Scott, L E Plunkett, N Killeen, G Onions.

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