A touch of melodrama has been anticipated in this last round of County Championship matches, with fluctuations as severe as a Roy Keane stare. Yet the last half an hour of play when Somerset squandered what had been the perfect start to their attempted heist of the Championship pennant they have never won, beggared belief.
At one point Somerset were basking at 302 for two after a record partnership against Nottinghamshire of 269 between Chris Rogers and James Hildreth. This position deteriorated to 322 for four after both centurions had been dismissed. Then the rot set in.
Somerset contrived to lose five wickets without scoring a run in the space of 22 deliveries. The home crowd was stunned; there may have been minor celebrations at Lord’s. Midway through the final session five vital batting points and a formidable total seemed assured. Now it is unlikely that Somerset will add to their three batting points, which may be significant when everything is totted up on Friday.
For Nottinghamshire Jake Ball, easily the outstanding bowler in an attack that, like Somerset’s, contained three spinners, took six for 47 including three wickets in that deadly period. At the start he had dismissed the openers, Marcus Trescothick and Tom Abell, in a most impressive spell with the first new ball.
At the other end Imran Tahir, who had bowled poorly in his earlier spells, was suddenly donated two wickets by Lewis Gregory (swishing and missing) and Roelof van der Merwe (blocking and missing). It was an astonishing collapse but it could not be attributed to the vagaries of the much-discussed pitch at Taunton, which offered some spin but little venom.
Both captains may have spent part of a bewildering day wondering whether they possessed the correct attack for the conditions. But for two innings of heroic proportions, Somerset’s Championship dreams would already be over. At the helm, perhaps for the last time, was Rogers, aged 39, who first visited these parts as a teenager when he played for North Devon CC at Instow, the home of the beloved umpire David Shepherd. He hit one of his stealthy hundreds, the 75th of his career, just what Somerset needed with so much at stake.
At the other end was Hildreth, who has reached stalwart status here – he made his Somerset debut 13 years ago. He hobbled to his 39th hundred gallantly. A yorker from Ball thudded into Hildreth’s right ankle when he had scored seven and he could barely move thereafter.
The problem was that Hildreth could barely put any weight on his right foot. Having hopped a single or two, Abell came out as a runner – fortunately Trescothick was successfully dissuaded from taking on that role – as Hildreth gritted his teeth and watched the ball. Once he tried to hook a bouncer from Brett Hutton and the sudden pressure put on his right foot found him in obvious agony.
But for most of the time Hildreth made a virtue of his impediment. He kept his head still while his right foot stayed static of its own accord and he played everything on its merits. Often Hildreth indulges in a galaxy of sweeps, reverse and orthodox against the spinner and he is usually good at that. But here he played gun-barrel straight; those sweeps were out of the question. Then, having started to relish the luxury of a runner, he suddenly accelerated, timing the ball exquisitely with those trademark square drives that made his runner redundant.
Both Hildreth and Rogers succumbed to the second new ball, giving catches behind the wicket. The easy conclusion – that they had done enough to ensure Somerset’s dominance in this game – was then swept away with a batting display down the order that was not the stuff of champions.
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