This week’s County Championships fixtures produced a satisfying mixture of shocks, record performances and heart-pounding finishes. Before this week, both Surrey and Lancashire were unbeaten and, at The Oval, you’d expect the former to retain that sequence against the latter. Thanks to a last-wicket stand of 130 between Sean Abbott and Dan Worrall, a first-innings lead was duly established. On day three, the Surrey seamers picked up regular wickets, leaving their batters a comfortable target of 208. However, Tom Bailey ran through the formidable top-order, including Tom Latham first ball, and Will Williams finished the job.
With the counties behind them also lacking consistency, Surrey are still looking good to retain their title. Essex advanced to second at the expense of Warwickshire at Chelmsford. Tom Westley and Dan Lawrence put on 227 for the third wicket before bowlers Porter and Harmer left the opponents facing the follow-on. Late flurries from Bess and Lintott forced the Essex openers to bat again but victory was achieved inside sixteen overs.
Hampshire made short work of Middlesex at Southampton, where Liam Dawson became the first Hampshire all-rounder to score a century and take ten wickets in the same match. The Londoners have only one batting bonus point on the board all season, a disturbing state of affairs. Kent also won by an innings, at the expense of bottom side Northamptonshire. Last week, Daniel Bell-Drummond was by far the leading T20 run scorer and this time he repeated the feat in red-ball cricket. He joined the select few Kent batsmen to strike a triple-century, moments before his tail-end partner was last man out.
At Taunton, Somerset made a dreadful start to their fixture
against Nottinghamshire, for whom Brett Hutton took 5-34. However, Matt Henry
began the turnaround with 6-59, his work continued by George Bartlett and teen
sensation James Rew whose tons took the second innings total beyond 500. Notts
had well over a day to compile 492 to win but they failed to survive even a few
hours. Somerset’s pace attack was ruthless, Josh Davey’s 4-17 the most
eye-catching figures. The enormous winning margin of 399 runs was Somerset’s second
largest runs victory in their Championship history.
In Division Two, leaders Durham were frustrated in their push for
a fifth triumph of the season. Their contest at Leicestershire yielded six centuries,
two of them from the Durham opener Alex Lees but the most crucial turned out to
come from Leicester’s Aussie Peter Handscomb. While all around him floundered, he
avoided the temptation to dig in, instead peppering the boundary twenty-one
times on the way to an unbeaten 136 and dominating a match-saving ninth wicket
partnership lasting twenty overs.
Leicester’s superior batting bonus points helped them leapfrog Sussex, who also required a desperate rearguard action to avoid defeat at the hands of Glamorgan. With nine wickets down, Oli Carter and Henry Shipley somehow managed to last more than twenty-one overs, the latter making only two scoring shots (both boundaries) from the 56 deliveries faced.
Bowlers struggled, too, at Headingley. The first-innings totals surpassed a thousand runs, including centuries by Bean, Hill and Revis (Yorkshire) and Oliver Price (Gloucestershire) and a draw was inevitable. It was the same outcome at Worcester, where winless Derbyshire looked likely to break their duck after skipper Luis Du Plooy shared partnerships of over 250 with each of Wayne Madsen and Anuj Dal. However, their bowlers were less successful, as Garth Roderick (123) and Ed Pollock (56 in almost four hours) anchored a dogged last-day dig-in to attain a draw.
Back to T20 mode now, where Worcestershire have much more chance of silverware…
Team of the Week:- Muyeye (Ken), Lees (Dur), Bell-Drummond (Ken), Du
Plooy (Der), Robinson (Dur +), Handscomb (Lei), Dawson (Ham), Abbott (Sur), McAndrew
(Sus), Williams (Lan), Henry (Som)
