4-54
Even-Stevens
4-54
By Dave Buxton
May 2 2003
Jon Dakin, playing against his former county, has put his current side right back into the match at Grace Road, as a rain interruped day 2 saw the match just about even-stevens, with Leicestershire still 3 runs adrift of Essex with only 3 wickets left. This despite Darren Stevens 65 for the hosts.
4-54
May 2 2003
Jon Dakin, playing against his former county, has put his current side right back into the match at Grace Road, as a rain interruped day 2 saw the match just about even-stevens, with Leicestershire still 3 runs adrift of Essex with only 3 wickets left. This despite Darren Stevens 65 for the hosts.
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Infact, the match could have been firmly in Essex's grasp, had there not been a succession of dropped catches. Three of them being ex-Essex 2nd team player Damien Brandy and Stevens when on 0 the previous night.
Stevens going onto to 65 seemed to be a real body blow for the scimitars, but his dismissal lead to three wickets falling for just 27 runs and the comeback from Larry's men was complete.
And it was Jon Dakin who was the main distroyer against his old team mates with two of those, three for the day and four in total for this match, while John Stephenson carried on his excellent first day with a wicket as well.
Infact, just 21.3 overs were possible and this with a bleak forecast for Friday, means that an interesting match looks set to be a draw.
Thursday's play didn't get underway until 2:00pm because of rain, but when it did, Essex set about getting stuck into the fragile Leicestershire middle-order and Dakin responded by trapping Paul Nixon lbw for 10, with just 10 runs added from the overnight score.
Brandy lived a charmed life in his 34 5th wicket partnership with Stevens, but it was the talented England academy batter who was next to go with the score 158-5, being underdone by two former team mates, as he was caught by Aftab Habib off Dakin's bowling for 65 from 119 balls.
After Dakin picked up his fourth victim by bowling Jeremy Snape for just 2, John Stephenson bowled Brandy for 21 and at 185-7 from 57.4 overs, the rain then came again and forced the players off the field and they didn't return.
No let-up in the constant drizzle lead to play being abandoned at 5:30pm, with Phil DeFreitas unbeaten on 8 and Jon Dakin ending with brilliant figures of 19-4-54-4 and John Stephenson 18.4-6-55-2.
So, excellent that we've got back into the match, which after day 1, seemed to be drifting away. However, with Friday's play set to be washed out, then a draw is the only way the game's going, unless the captains can agree another thrilling finish as last week.
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Jon Dakin - Has put Essex right back into the match with his bowling against his former county.
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Date: 1/5/03
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