In choosing to opt out of the opening rounds of the county championship Alex Hales must have been given some sort of assurance that he would at least make it to the starting gate as Alastair Cook’s opening partner for the first Test against Sri Lanka. It is a gamble on his part, though, for this is the time of year when a spell of early season form can at least put names in the frame.
So, while Hales continues with his feet up, and Cook broods about being railroaded into using equipment he considers inappropriate (no doubt to satisfy the demands of the insurance industry), openers emeritus yet prospective enjoyed a mixed day. There were centuries for Adam Lyth and Sam Robson, who with the brief exception in the winter of the Moeen Ali expedient against Pakistan are Hales’ immediate predecessors. And then there was the antithesis, a first-ball duck for Nick Compton, who currently holds the No3 spot but who once formed a profitable opening partnership with Cook: Compton began last season similarly.
It was Robson who emerged from the day with the most impressive figures, batting right through as Middlesex took the first-day honours against Warwickshire. It was a glorious day for batting at Lord’s, although Warwickshire chose to let the home side bat first on a pitch that will have been damp and which will only play better provided the clouds stay away. It is almost a year since Robson last made a hundred but by the close, in an innings spread over more than six hours, he batted virtually flawlessly to reach 175, with 24 fours, many of which were driven through extra cover with what is his crisp elbow-high signature stroke. But early ones were clipped precisely off his legs and down the slope to the Tavern as the bowlers from the Pavilion end made the fundamental error of bowling too straight and full to a right-hander.
The Warwickshire attack was depleted by the absence of Chris Woakes and Boyd Rankin, both with niggles sustained in last week’s championship opener against Hampshire, but after an indifferent morning it found its sea legs during the afternoon.
By mid-afternoon Robson and Nick Gubbins had taken their opening stand to 180 and, with Robson already into three figures, looked good for many more when Gubbins, on 68, looking to force off the back foot, edged Chris Wright to second slip.
One wicket immediately brought a second as Compton pushed out firmly at his first ball, which bounced a fraction more than expected perhaps and from near the shoulder of the bat, flew to the left of Sam Hain in the gully who held a spectacular full- length catch.
Warwickshire continued to chip away. Dawid Malan, a left-hander, looked to have settled in when, expecting the ball to shape down the slope away from him, he misjudged the line from Keith Barker and was bowled without offering a stroke.
Adam Vosges, on the other hand, attempted to chop away a delivery from Barker, with the new ball now, but it was too close to him, came back a shade and deflected on to his stumps. Robust batting from John Simpson (31 not out) and an unbroken fifth-wicket stand of 54 took Middlesex to the close.
