Paul Edwards has news of some amazing goings on in Scarborough, where there are spectators gazing at the pitch at the moment. They are probably wondering how 25 wickets fell in the first four sessions of this game.
The reason for their amazement is that they have just watched Adil Rashid and Glenn Maxwell score 211 runs in 38 overs between lunch and tea. Maxwell is 135 not out at the break, his maiden first-class century for Yorkshire, while Rashid is on 102 having reached his hundred with a cover-driven four off Jamie Harrison in the last over of the session. The stand currently stands at 236 and is the fourth highest for the sixth wicket in Yorkshire’s history.
The pair have needed a bit of luck but they have batted with increasing assurance and have almost completely broken the Durham attack with a succession of fine strokes. In a sense it has justified the judgement of those who thought there was nothing fundamentally wrong with this North Marine Road pitch. All it needed was a couple of batsmen prepared to select their shots carefully when they batted on it.
All this may have put those who saved a night’s accommodation by booking out of their hotels into a bit of a quandary. At lunch this game looked fairly likely to be over inside two days; now we might just all be here on Monday. Extraordinary stuff in a season which has already seen the Bresnan/Bairstow and Prince/Petersen stands.
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It’s time for some tea at Lord’s and Middlesex enjoyed a good session, picking up four wickets, but Sussex have fought back well in the last 40 minutes and lead by 16. Mike Yardy – in his last appearance at Lord’s – was just what the doctors of Sussex were ordering and has been as nuggety and tough as ever, bringing up his 50 just before the break. He and Ashar Zaidi have compulsively swept Ravi Patel, who bowled really excellently in his 17 straight overs, with four for 42, including seven maidens. Zaidi rather ruined his figures with two boundaries off the last two balls of his spell, over mid-on and to square-leg. Nicely poised this, enjoy your cuppa. It’s 250 for six.
Right, this is interesting now. Nash got out in very silly fashion,
trying to hit Patel into the Tavern – it’s a short boundary, admittedly – but only finding Roland-Jones at mid-on, who did well under a skier. Then Luke Wright came out and really struggled to get going, taking 22 balls to get off the mark, before looking to pull a Tim Murtagh delivery nowhere near short enough for the shot and being bowled. He was furious with himself, and that’s Murtagh’s 499th wicket for Middlesex. It’s 205 for five and the substantial lead Sussex should have got is looking less likely now. Yardy is key.
Over in Scarborough, Paul Edwards scents change in the air in the match between Yorkshire and Durham.
The architecture and the probable length of this match has been changed in the 75 minutes after lunch. Batting with calculated aggression and fine discrimination, Glenn Maxwell and Adil Rashid have extended their sixth-wicket stand to 99 and Yorkshire are 178-5, a lead of 184.
After the limp display offered by many batsmen on both sides over the past day and a half, the stand has made something of a refreshing change, although Durham’s bowlers would plainly not agree. Indeed, John Hastings has made his discontent plain by bowling a string of useless short-pitched deliveries, something which eventually incurred the ire of umpire Nick Cook.
Both batsmen have played false shots and both have ridden their luck. But there has been no sense of a wicket being incipient, as has been the case for much of this match. Maxwell reached his maiden first-class 50 for Yorkshire off 62 balls and having hit six fours. At the risk of “tempting fate”, a concept I have always regarded as a complete load of cobblers, it will be interesting to see whether the pair’s stand develops now that they are used to this wicket.
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Luke Wells was caught well at slip by Franklin off Patel shortly after lunch but Chris Nash and Mike Yardy have steadied the ship since, carrying Sussex to 199 for three and putting on 40-odd. Patel’s bowled well, with four maidens in his first five overs – they’ve got after him a bit more since – with good flight and a bit of turn. The seamers are struggling a bit from the Nursery End. Murtagh – on 498 wickets for Middlesex – has Simpson standing up to the stumps at the moment. Yardy has just edged short of second slip off his bowling, nice soft hands really are the ticket on this pitch. Yardy’s looking solid, although these days his technique is almost a parody of itself, with such an elaborate crab across the crease, while Nash has also looked good, plonking Patel to cow.
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Paul Edwards is in Scarborough, where Yorkshire are defying the doubters against Durham. Just about.
Many Yorkshire supporters arrived at Scarborough this morning believing that their team could not bat as poorly in their second innings as they had in their first. Others – we shall label them the miserabilist tendency – were convinced that such underachievement was indeed within the compass of Andrew Gale’s men.
Well, it is the former who have won the day, but only just. 104-5 is indeed better than 94-7, but it is a close-run thing and not the untroubled progression towards a large lead that most of the crowd envisaged when they preferred watching county cricket in the flesh to Test cricket or even association football on the box.
Durham’s attack is, of course, very formidable. Graham Onions took two wickets this morning and the second of them, that of Andrew Gale, was his 500th in first-class cricket. Yorkshire’s skipper had made only one and gloved a ball which rather spat off a length; there was not much he could do about it. However, some of his colleagues were not so blameless, notably Alex Lees – who was caught at the wicket by Michael Richardson when pushing forward limply – and Jack Leaning, who clipped Jamie Harrison to Stoneman at midwicket.
It was all rather grim stuff for the local folk, who had checked in at their hotels in the hope of seeing four days’ cricket. But this is also a popular fixture as far as Durham supporters are concerned, and the cheers emanating from the north stand when Harrison bowled Ballance off the bottom edge recalled the match two years ago when Durham’s win here was a prelude to their taking the Championship.
As I write, spectators are taking their ease on the outfield. One senses that people regard this as a right rather than a privilege in these parts. However, they would enjoy successful attacking batting from Adil Rashid and Glenn Maxwell even more.
Finally, just before lunch, a wicket came. Machan had played brilliantly for his 81, all but three of which came this morning, and had shared 134 with the more watchful Wells. But Ravi Patel is back in Middlesex colours (white) and gave us a glimpse of why they’ve gone for two spinners. Wells spanked him to the offside boundary in his first over but, in his second, he flighted one up to Machan, brought him forward on the drive, spun it through his gate and took out his stumps. Well bowled that man, brave stuff. I would think that, come day three and four, it may turn plenty here. Don’t forget the track was used on Thursday for the RLODC match with Nottinghamshire, too.
Emphatically Sussex’s morning in good batting conditions, though. Machan was compact and brutal and contrasts nicely with the taller, more languid Wells. Chris Nash is in now and has just hit the last ball before the break for four with a sumptuous late cut and, all in one movement, turned to the pavilion to walk off. Sensational stuff. Sussex are 160 for two and Middlesex’s 234 – despite what I thought yesterday – is looking rather meagre. Enjoy your lunch, and if you’re in London, head down here for the afternoon. It won’t cost you much and it’s really lovely.
Also, it’s Gus Fraser’s 50th birthday, so you can head down here and wish the big man well!
So where were you when England won the Ashes? I was watching James Harris bowl to Matt Machan at Lord’s. There was a big round of applause when the great victory was announced. Hurrah!
Anyway, back to business. Machan has gone to a fine 50, with some lovely straight drives, and Luke Wells has got in on the act too. He has 44 and Machan has raced to 67. He’s great to watch. I suggested that 234 might not be a bad score, but with 125 already to Sussex’s name, that looks misplaced.
It was a quiet-ish first 40 minutes at Lord’s (of course it was) but Sussex built their score on a day that looks really good for batting, even if the pitch showed a couple of demonic signs last night. Machan has been wonderfully compact, while the lanky Wells produced a wristy flick to square leg and a nice cut. He nudged the first ball of the day to the fine leg fence for four too.
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Paul Edwards is in Scarborough, where Yorkshire v Durham has taken a temporary back seat to hotel housekeeping and, well, England winning the Ashes:
Scarborough, for all its many attractions, is still a rather conservative town. For example, amusements and the gaudier kitsch of seaside life are confined to the area around the Old Harbour, thus leaving the majestic sweep of the North Bay in genteel peace. This conservatism also manifests itself in the old routine of Saturday being the changeover day at B&Bs and hotels, and this apparently limits the Saturday attendance at North Marine Road.
However, there are still a few thousand here already and maybe plenty more will come in now that England have regained the Ashes, an event that was warmly applauded twice by spectators, once when the news filtered through and again when it was announced. This led to rather sad confusion for Jamie Harrison, who thought that spectators were applauding his over as he returned to long leg. Instead they were clapping the national side, two other Durham cricketers and Mark Wood’s horse no doubt.
There has been cricket here, too, and most reassuringly peaceful it has been for Yorkshire supporters after the mayhem of yesterday. The home side have lost just one wicket, that of Alex Lees, who was caught behind off Chris Rushworth for 19 when pushing forward at the ball with no great feet movement. Otherwise, the home side have progressed to 58-1 after 20 overs, a lead of 64.
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Hello and welcome to today’s county cricket action. Will Macpherson is at Lord’s for day two of Middlesex v Sussex and Paul Edwards is in sunny Scarborough for Yorkshire v Durham. Here’s Will with a scene-setter to get us started:
Good morning from an absolutely glorious, sun-soaked, toasty Lord’s for what promises to be an intriguing second day between Middlesex and Sussex. I gather, through texts from friends and family, that there is also some other cricket going on a few hours further north in Nottingham, and I’m also told there’s even some football beginning, too. But this is cricket I know nothing of. Today all the cricket I know is Middlesex against Sussex at Lord’s and the updates I will faithfully file for the County Cricket - Live! blog, no doubt the only cricket liveblog anyone with any sense is reading today.
I’m very excited to say that joining me on the blog today is the finest county cricket writer in the land, Paul Edwards. He’s at wonderful North Marine Road, subbing in for Richard Gibson – I suspect he’s at that “other cricket” I referenced in Nottingham – where there was an utterly absurd day’s cricket between the two most recent County Champions. I’m looking forward to hearing about how the oddities unfold from Paul. Apparently there was a crowd of north of 9,000 there yesterday, which is just grand.
Elsewhere, there is yet more cricket. At Worcester, Nottinghamshire started well in response to the hosts’ 269, while cricket sounded rather old-fashioned (!) at the Ageas Bowl yesterday, as Hampshire hauled themselves to 255 for eight against Warwickshire. In Division Two, there were tons for Nick Browne and Mark Pettini against Surrey at Colchester, and a Wayne Madsen daddy helped Derbyshire 320 for eight against Leicestershire.
I, personally, have had a slightly odd start to this fine Saturday. A man barged through the barriers with me – the cheeky blighter didn’t have a ticket so thought he’d make use of mine – at St John’s Wood station just now, and then we’ve just had the mother of all Lord’s tours into the media centre. I’m going to hazard a guess at 50 people – some of whom were French - so I’m now in loads and loads of photo albums. Never been gawped at quite like that, I have to say.
If you’re anywhere near this fine ground or any of the other fine grounds where county cricket is being played today, I implore you to head down. We don’t get much Championship cricket on a Saturday these days, so soak it up while the sun’s out. Enjoy the cricket.
