Will Luxton hailed a “dream” day as his maiden first-team century helped Yorkshire wrap up a superb Metro Bank One-Day Cup win over previously unbeaten Warwickshire at Rugby School today.
Luxton, 21, batted at number three and came in at 25-1 pursuing 243.
He reached his century off 116 balls and later hit the winning runs to seal a six-wicket success with 105 not out.
George Hill had set up Yorkshire’s victory, one which maintains a faint chance of knockout qualification ahead of Wednesday’s final round trip to Glamorgan, with a brilliant career best 6-28 as the Bears were limited to 242-9.
Harry Duke and Matthew Revis also impressed with half-centuries, the latter also taking two wickets to add to an unbeaten 51.
Duke set the tone with a belligerent 60 opening the batting.
Luxton shared a half-century stand for the second wicket with Duke and a century stand for the fifth, unbroken, with Revis.
Luxton beamed: “It’s brilliant. We spoke all last year and this year about one of the top four needing to go on and get 100 not out. We played pretty much the perfect game.
“Hilly got six-for and dragged it back. We thought 240 was a decent score, but they could maybe have got a few more.
“Then we talked about setting a platform. Credit to Dukey, it hasn’t gone the way he would have wanted it to go this year, but he went and played brilliantly.”
When Luxton and Revis came together, Yorkshire were 117-4 in the 20th over with the game in the balance, but the pair saw things through with a 129 partnership.
“It was only four-an-over for most of the game, and Rev played brilliantly under a bit of pressure,” said Luxton. “There was a bit of sledging, but he handled it well and should be proud of himself.
“It didn’t really do much seam wise, but it spun quite a lot. We knew that was going to happen because it was dry this morning.”
It was only right at the end that Luxton’s century came into view as the runs whittled down, but he hit back-to-back sixes off Rob Yates to get him there.
He said: “The off-spinner was on, so I thought, ‘May as well try and get this game over with’. I managed to creep to a hundred, and it’s a good feeling.
“I’ve been wanting to do it for a while, so it was nice to finally get over the line.
“You can’t beat getting a hundred, walking off the pitch as part of a winning team.
“It was a dream.”
