By Lower Mound
August 12 2012

Arriving at the ground in good time courtesy of Southern Trains going via Brighton, we made our way to the top of the South West stand, where we could get a good view of the proceedings on the pitch. There was a full complement of the Winsky clan, two definitely there for the Middle, the other just to see what we get up to when we go to cricket. Off the pitch, we were entertained by a man dressed like the main character in Sacha Baron Cohen’s The Dictator, who was with his merry men.

Sussex, resuming on 106-3, with Ed Joyce on 49 and Mike Yardy on 24, moved the score onto 134. Corey Collymore, bowling from the Sea End, just failed to take a catch off his bowling diving to his left when Yardy was on 35. Soon later with the score on 142, Sussex lost their first wicket of the day, when Joyce was caught by John Simpson off the bowling of Toby Roland-Jones for 68, which was to be the first of six for TRJ in the innings, with a ball that rose quite sharply. Luke Wright was next in, and he scored 3 off the first ball he faced. With the score on 157, Yardy moved onto a patient 50, with a four down to the members’ stand. With the score moving onto 166, Wright was caught with a fine slip catch by Dawid Malan off Tim Murtagh for 10. That brought in Ben Brown, and he and Yardy stayed in until lunch, with Brown on 4 and Yardy on 66. Yardy had therefore scored just 42 in the session.

After lunch, Yardy brought up the 200 with a boundary in the 76^th over. With the score on 205-5, TRJ took the new ball from the Cromwell Road End. With just one further run added, TRJ had his second wicket of the day when he had Brown caught by Simpson for 12. Steve Magoffin was next in, but with the score on 238, the Middle finally managed to get Yardy out, caught by Murts off TRJ for 89 for his third wicket of the day. That brought James Anyon to the crease, and with the score on 256, Magoffin, who was on 26, was dropped by Malan off the bowling of Gareth Berg. Time and time again, Anyon and Magoffin played and missed. Two overs before tea, CC, bowling for the Sea End, had Magoffin caught behind by Simmo for 35 with the score on 281, giving them a lead of 111 at this stage. At tea, Sussex were 285-8, Anyon on 27 and Amjad Khan on 3.

Just after tea, Anyon was bowled by TRJ for 29, and that brought Monty Panesar to the crease with the loudest cheer of the day, but he didn’t bother the scorers, as he was out first ball lbw to TRJ, who will start Sussex’s second innings on a hat-trick, giving him best ever figures of 6-66. It was a dogged performance by Sussex, and superb line and length bowling by Middlesex, as all of the bowlers bowled well and made Sussex fight hard for their runs.

Chris Rogers and Sam Robson opened the batting for Middlesex, and unlike Sussex, who went at a slow pace, we went at a rate of more than 4 an over to start with, and Buck found batting quite easy, hitting glorious seven fours, before being caught behind by Brown for Panesar for 48 with the score on 72.  Joe Denly came in, but didn’t last very long, being bowled by Magoffin for 8. The Man of the Match so far for Middlesex, TRJ, came in and took the score to stumps with Middlesex on 92-2, with Robbo and 24 and TRJ on 5, although luckily TRJ was dropped by the close fielder Chris Nash.

All in all, a fine day was had, as we had an excellent lunch with the Sussex Cricket Society. The day was bathed in glorious sunshine, we visited the museum and watched the start of what will hopefully turn out on Sunday to be a Middlesex fightback.