GLOUCESTERSHIRE captain Alex Gidman admits his squad are deflated after starting their Friends Provident t20 campaign with three heavy defeats.

With Muttiah Muralitharan on board, hopes were high that the Gladiators could change their fortunes in a competition in which they have struggled in recent seasons, but the Sri Lankan spin legend only has one wicket to his name so far, while the batsmen have failed to make three figures in two of the three innings’ so far.

In a game reduced to 17 overs due to rain, Gloucestershire could only reach 97-9 against Sussex at Bristol on Sunday.

Although Muralitharan took his first wicket for Gloucestershire, removing England international Luke Wright for 13, the Sharks sailed to victory with seven wickets and 15 balls in hand.

Gidman said: "It's been tough. The guys are very deflated.

“Obviously, the majority of the things we spoke about before the campaign haven't come off.

"The first two games were pretty brutal ones for us, but coming here and losing like this was disappointing.

“We were unfortunate with the weather, which made the wicket pretty hard work, but that's absolutely no excuse.

"The beauty is we've got a lot of cricket left in the competition. We've got to try and keep our chins up and try to fight back."

Gloucestershire started their campaign with an eight wicket loss against Surrey at The Oval.

After Gloucestershire made 155-8 Steven Davies blasted 92 not out off 55 balls to lead the hosts to a comfortable victory.

Worse was to come for Gloucestershire as they were bowled out for just 82 in a 122-run defeat at Essex, with five batsmen, including the top three of Gidman, Hamish Marshall and Chris Taylor, falling for 0.

Muralitharan took 0-27 in each of the first two games before returning his best figures of 1-24 from four overs against Sussex.

The Gloucester Festival is being held this weekend, with the Gladiators facing Hampshire on Friday and Surrey on Saturday (both 5.30pm).