Andrew Gale and Phil Jaques starred in Yorkshire's highest ever opening stand to get their Friends Life t20 campaign up and running with a routine 22-run win over defending champions Leicestershire at Headingley.

The pair shared 116 inside 13 overs to help post a commanding 170-4 - Gale making 70 off 42 balls and Jaques 48 off 41 - before Leicester replied with 148.

Left-handers Gale and Jaques fashioned an immediate recovery from Friday's opening North Division defeat against Durham, in which they bowled and fielded well but batted poorly for large parts. Yesterday was a far more polished display.

The visitors started their chase brightly thanks in the main to Josh Cobb's 46 off 28 balls, helping to take their score to 85-2 in the early stages of the tenth over - Rich Pyrah had taken both wickets, including Jacques du Toit with a one-handed effort off his own bowling.

But the game-breaking moment came when Cobb and West Indian Ramnaresh Sarwan (45) had a mix-up which gave wicketkeeper Jonny Bairstow time to throw to bowler Moin Ashraf, who whipped off the bails at the non-striker's end.

From there, Yorkshire always looked like winning. Azeem Rafiq took two wickets before, with the Foxes needing 50 off five overs with five wickets in hand, Ryan Sidebottom turned the screw with some expert death bowling.

Pyrah, Rafiq and Sidebottom took two wickets before Australian Mitchell Starc removed Wayne White, Ned Eckersley and Matthew Hoggard in the contest's final over.

After only taking nine runs from the first two overs following Gale's decision to bat first, Yorkshire's opening pair got into their stride after Jaques hit Hoggard for six over long-on in the third over.

Gale, who hit six fours and three sixes in total, then edged a four, pulled a six over mid-wicket and pulled another boundary as 14 came off the fifth over, with Yorkshire's 50 coming up in the sixth, the last of the powerplay.

The skipper, who notched a duck against Durham, brought up his half-century off 29 balls before Jaques hit successive leg-side sixes off Claude Henderson's left-arm spin to take the score beyond 100 in the 13th.

Yorkshire lost some impetus when the pair departed in the space of nine balls between the end of the 12th over and the early stages of the 14th, both falling to catches in the deep off Rob Taylor and Hoggard respectively.

And, although they could have been defending closer to 200, Bairstow (17 off 13 balls) and David Miller shared an entertaining third-wicket stand of 39 off 26 balls. Miller finished unbeaten on 30 off 20 balls.

White, who removed Bairstow and Gary Ballance in the 19th over, was unfortunate not to have taken a hat-trick having forced Miller to chop onto his stumps. The only problem for him, the bails remained intact.