Sussex’s long wait for a win in the Royal London One-Day Cup is over after they beat Middlesex by 31 runs under the lights at Hove today.

The county had not won in the 50-overs competition since August, 2014, but a shorter format suited them.

Phil Salt scored 81 and Chris Jordan took 5-28 to help settle a contest reduced to 32 overs per side by morning rain.

Sussex set 222-7 after being sent in, a score largely built around a third-wicket stand worth 135 between Salt and Ross Taylor.

Salt’s 81 came off 76 balls and featured ten fours plus a six as the young North Walian combined a range of attacking shots with sharp running between the wickets.

Taylor made 54 off 44 deliveries, going to his half century with his second six and then being caught off the next ball attempting a repeat.

Sussex lost impetus for a while after the pair went in quick succession.

But Ben Brown hit an unbeaten 31 off 13 balls at the end including two sixes in the final over, delivered by James Fuller.

Jordan had Dawid Malan caught at first slip by Harry Finch and Paul Stirling snapped up by Brown, with a juggling effort, early in the reply.

For a while it seemed Brendon McCullum and Eoin Morgan might match Sussex’s third-wicket pair.

They added 40 and looked in great nick before McCullum was brilliantly caught in the deep by a running, diving Danny Briggs off George Garton for 53 off just 37 balls.

Morgan followed for 31, bowled as he looked to sweep the excellent Will Beer.

Franklin hit a breezy 28 and threatened a rescue act until being picked up low down on the mid-wicket boundary by substitute fielder Luke Wells off Briggs.

Nick Gubbins was caught behind for 37 aiming an expansive drive off Garton and Briggs held another one on the boundary, hooked to him at a fierce rate of knots by Toby Roland-Jones off Jordan.

The end came when Jordan clean bowled Fuller in the 31st over.