Leicestershire Foxes host Worcestershire at Grace Road in a pivotal Royal London One-Day Cup clash on Thursday.
Yorkshire, Essex and Gloucestershire have already secured their passage to the quarter-finals from Group A, while Derbyshire currently occupy the fourth and final qualifying spot.
Worcestershire and Leicestershire are fifth and six respectively, with the latter having played a game less and tomorrow’s winner will lift themselves into fourth.
Worcestershire missed out on the opportunity to do so during Wednesday’s action as they went down to a Duckworth-Lewis defeat to Gloucestershire, although Tom Fell and Alexei Kervezee impressed with the bat and Mitchell McClenaghan provided some welcome hostility with the ball.
In the group’s other game, Northants Steelbacks must beat the already eliminated Lancashire Lightning at Emirates Old Trafford to keep their faint qualification hopes on track.
There is a lot more up for grabs in Group B, where five sides with remaining quarter-final aspirations are in action across three matches.
Warwickshire head a cluster of four teams locked together on seven points and travel to face Glamorgan, who will leapfrog them in the standings with a game to go if they triumph at the SWALEC Stadium - although they must do without James Harris.
Durham must realistically secure two points against bottom-place Surrey at the Emirates Durham ICG in what will be their final group encounter.
That would secure a final tally of nine-points for the north-east county, who fired their qualification prospects with animpressive win over Notts.
Victory came at a cost, however, as Graham Onions suffered a side strain and the seamer will miss out against Surrey, while Ben Stokes headed off to join England’s squad for the fifth Investec Test buoyed by a superb century.
Chris Rushworth, Michael Richardson and Keaton Jennings are included in the squad, the latter two having scored fifties on second XI duty against Lancashire this week.
Middlesex Panthers and Notts Outlaws meet at Lord’s in the day’s televised clash, where the hosts must win to stay in the hunt and go level with their visitors on - that’s right, you guessed it - seven points.
The Outlaws are handed a timely boost to their prospects by the return of star batsmen Alex Hales and James Taylor from England Lions duty.
“I’m pleased to have them back into the team,” said Notts coach Mick Newell on his county’s official website.
“It has been difficult three games without them but they’re back from important matches and have scored well.
“They should be feeling confident, they’ve both made hundreds in the last week or so but these are important matches for us and for us to qualify we’ll need to win these games and Its important that they put in a good performance.”