Somerset pull off dramatic win over Surrey in thrilling finish
The County Championship title race has been blown wide open after Somerset snatched a dramatic victory over the leaders, Surrey, with a couple of minutes to spare at Taunton, the champions’ stout defensive rearguard toppled after they collapsed from 95 for three to 109 all out in a final hour overflowing with tension.
Archie Vaughan was again to the fore, the teenage son of the former England captain Michael burnishing an incredible second first-class match with a second five-wicket haul. But it was Jack Leach, who also took five, who struck the concluding blows, ending a defiant ninth-wicket partnership between Kemar Roach and Jordan Clark when he had the latter caught behind before pinning Dan Worrall lbw second ball to spark jubilation among Somerset’s players.
Joining them on crutches on the outfield was Tom Banton, whose heroic 46 earlier in the day had helped give Somerset a platform despite the batter sustaining an injury in the warm-up on Wednesday. Chasing 221, Surrey played unashamedly for the draw and a defensive masterclass from two pre-Bazball England discards – Dom Sibley and Ben Foakes – looked set to foil Somerset until Leach dismissed both and forced the door open for Vaughan to take the prized wickets of the one-match freelancer Shakib Al Hasan, caught at slip, and Tom Curran as well as Cameron Steel. Surrey, missing eight players on England duty, now lead Division One by only eight points with two matches remaining in a title race set to go the distance.
At Chester-le-Street, Matthew Potts took a career-best nine for 68 in Durham’s thumping innings victory against Lancashire as he reprised the early season county form that earned him an England recall this summer. In a match of tumbling records (David Bedingham hitting the county’s highest individual score of 279 on Wednesday), Potts broke the back of some lower order defiance led by Matty Hurst. Defeat left Lancashire 11 points adrift of Nottinghamshire and safety, Notts also subsiding to an innings defeat by Essex, who responded to their 12-point deduction on Wednesday by picking up 23 with victory at Chelmsford.
A century from Warwickshire’s Will Rhodes, along with the rain, denied Worcestershire a fourth consecutive win at New Road while Jack Leaning’s century helped doomed Kent escape with a draw against Hampshire.
In the Second Division Middlesex’s promotion hopes suffered a major blow in a four-wicket defeat by Gloucestershire at Lord’s. The visitors’ victory was underpinned by a fluent fourth-wicket partnership between the left-handers Miles Hammond and James Bracey. A three-wicket burst from the spinner Joshua de Caires gave the hosts brief hope before Tom Price and Zafar Gohar steadied the ship to steer Gloucestershire home and put them in good spirits going into T20 Blast finals day Middlesex’s defeat leaves the top two, Sussex and Yorkshire, set fair for promotion.
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And that’s this round of fixtures done, the third damn fine round in a row. There’s life in this maligned competition yet. A roundup will appear in due course but, in the meantime, thanks for your company and comments over the past four days. Fun has been had. Bye.
