Essex County Cricket Club played their cricket during the 2005 season in Division Two of the County Championship and Division One of the Sunday League. They started the season 8–1 to win the Second Division Title, and were second in the Championship table at 9 May, but five matches without a win following that sent them down to fifth place at the Twenty20 break in June. They only intermittently broke into the top three after the Twenty20 break, and when they did their opponents behind them usually had a game in hand. They finished fifth, 15.5 points behind the promotion spot, and with 36 bowling points they picked up the fewest in the entire Division Two. In the National League, however, they only lost once in sixteen games – against Gloucestershire Gladiators in August – and won the League on 28 August with three games to play. In the C&G Trophy, they went out to Lancashire at the second round stage, while they finished fifth in the group stage of the Twenty20 Cup, two points off a guaranteed quarter-final spot. Essex played 17 first-class games in 2005, winning six, drawing seven and losing four. They also played 18 List A games, winning 14, losing two and having two no-results, and in eight Twenty20 games they won three, lost three and had two no-results. Players Andre Adams Danish Kaneria André Nel Dale Steyn Jahid Ahmed Justin Bishop Ravinder Bopara Maurice Chambers Andy Clarke Alastair Cook Ashley Cowan Ryan ten Doeschate Andy Flower Grant Flower James Foster Darren Gough Paul Grayson Will Jefferson James Middlebrook Graham Napier Tony Palladino Mark Pettini Tim Phillips Nick Thornicroft Alex Tudor Mervyn Westfield Paul Grayson Tables Championship totesport League Twenty20 Group Stage (South) Match details April Their first first-class game of the season was a four wicket win against Cambridge UCCE, as a warm-up before their first County Championship game against Yorkshire, which was drawn after rain fell on all four days. Then there was a rain-affected win in the Sunday League against Hampshire and a mid-week game against Glamorgan, which was abandoned as a "no result" without a ball being bowled. Essex then beat Somerset by nine wickets in the Championship, chasing 77 to win to go second in the Division Two table, seven points behind Durham. MCC University Match: Cambridge UCCE v Essex (9–11 April) Essex beat Cambridge UCCE by 4 wickets Cambridge UCCE