With a home quarter-final already in the bag, Gloucestershire stumbled to a four-wicket defeat in their final Friends Provident Trophy group game against Durham at Riverside.

Defeat in five of the first six games had left Durham with no chance of progress, but they won the last two without experienced trio Steve Harmison, Callum Thorp and Michael di Venuto.

They were also unable to recall Graham Onions because he emerged from the second Test against the West Indies with an Achilles injury and is to have a scan.

Neil Killeen bagged five wickets on his first appearance of the season after a calf injury. He took three of them in the 49th over, but despite that late stumble Gloucestershire had underlined their one-day prowess by recovering from a poor start to make 254 for eight.

The 10.45am start made a difference as batting proved tricky in the first hour as they slipped to 72 for five after being put in.

New Zealander James Franklin and wicketkeeper Steve Adshead put on 175, beating the record sixth-wicket stand against Durham in the premier cup, which was 126 by Chris Taylor and Ant Botha at Derby in 2006.

Franklin made 85 and Adshead a one-day best of 87 before both holed out in the 49th over, during which Killeen also had Jon Lewis caught to finish with five for 48.

Earlier Killeen bowled Hamish Marshall via an inside edge with the last ball of his second over and had Alex Gidman caught behind with the first ball of his third.

Chris Taylor made a fluent 36 before chopping a ball from Liam Plunkett into his stumps, bringing in Adshead with an average of 50.5 in the competition this season.

Without taking any risks he initially outpaced Franklin and completed a 64-ball 50 by top-edging 17-year-old Ben Stokes' sixth ball for four.

Stokes' only over, the 39th, cost 14, as did the next, bowled by Gareth Breese, during which Franklin went to his half-century off 74 balls with a huge straight six.

Kyle Coetzer got Durham's reply off to a brisk start with 36 off 35 balls before half-centuries by left-handers Phil Mustard and Ian Blackwell put them within sight of victory.

Both were severe on young left-arm spinner Vikram Banerjee, but he emerged with three wickets after Blackwell pulled him to deep mid-wicket to bring in Stokes with 42 needed off 11 overs.

When the youngster had faced seven balls without scoring he went down the pitch to Banerjee and was stumped. But Dale Benkenstein all but completed the task, falling for 44 with the scores level and two overs left.