Major contribution

By Jonathan Winsky
August 6 2016

Jonathan Winsky reports on a day that looked promising for us at one stage but ended up with Surrey on top. We also hear about over rate issues. Thank you for sharing with us Jonathan

Middlesex started day three on 249-5 and were 166 behind Surrey, In an attempt to unsettle the batsmen, the first over of the day and the last before the availability of the second new ball, was bowled by Dominic Sibley. Thankfully, we were able to get through the over unscathed and brought the 250 up. The new ball was taken by Tom Curran, and in the following over, his brother Sam bowled James Franklin for 17, which was not the start we wanted. It got even worse when, 2 overs later, Sam Curran dismissed John Simpson lbw for 58. 

This dampened my mood, as Lower Mound was cracking me up with his suggestion that the concept of deducting points from teams who have a slow over rate should work in reverse too, with teams being awarded points for each over they finish in the green. The flaw of that would be that teams would no longer need to play well in order to get points, but could instead just run up from a couple of yards and bowl 150+ overs in a day to finish with an over rate of more than +100 to take that many points from the match! It would basically reward quantity over quality.

As I was writing that paragraph, Sam Curran took his third wicket of the day and his second lbw to dismiss Toby Roland-Jones for 7. Lower Mound said that he didn’t think the two lbws should have been given out. James Harris fell to Tom Curran on 9 after a slip fielder parried it to fellow slip fielder Steven Davies. Ollie Rayner and Tim Murtagh were able to put on 15 for the final wicket, before Rayner was caught by wicket-keeper Ben Foakes for 8 to give Sam Curran his fourth wicket of the day and we were all out for 293. As I had feared, Surrey were able to take an early wicket with the new ball to expose and quickly dismiss our tail. 

Surrey started their reply 122 ahead, so had a good headstart in their quest to set us a challenging fourth innings target. Our over rate started at -1, which was in contrast to Surrey’s +8. The 12 overs they faced before lunch were nowhere near as eventful as what had happened earlier, with only 17 runs scored and no wickets falling. We ended the session with an over rate of -3, although Don Shelley got it changed to -2 by the start of the following session.

The slow-scoring continued into the start of the afternoon session. Early into it, Rory Burns offered a half-chance, but Nick Compton couldn't quite take the chance at third slip, and the ball went to the Warner stand boundary. The run rate picked up when Burns scored 13 off Harris’s first over, but he was bowled by TRJ with the first ball of the next over having scored 39 out of 47. This brought in Zafar Ansari, but he fell lbw for a four-ball duck to give TRJ a double-wicket maiden. The match further swung our way when Sibley was caught behind off the final ball of the following over having scored just 7 in all this time, and this gave Harris a wicket maiden. And it got even better when Aaron Finch was lbw to TRJ to make it four wickets for no runs in 12 balls! In the following overs, TRJ and Harris threatened to take further wickets, but Jason Roy and Davies survived. TRJ left the field having bowled 11 of the first 24 overs (or 11 of the first 12 to have been bowled from the Pavilion end) either side of lunch to bring about the rare sight of Murtagh bowling from that end. Dial M bowled three overs, before being replaced by Rayner, who not only helped increase the over rate from what at one point had slipped to -5, but also dismissed Davies thanks to a close catch from Compo. In Rayner’s next over, he dismissed Roy after he tried to sweep, but was instead bowled. We were unable to take any more wickets in the session, as Foakes and Sam Curran took Surrey to 142-6 at tea. Better news was that the scoreboard showed the over rate was now -1, which Don confirmed to be the case when we walked past him at tea.

Our over rate reached 0 at about 5:00pm. Shortly after, Foakes hit a fifty into the Grand stand to bring up the 50 partnership off 137 balls in 72 minutes, which made for an impressive amount of overs bowled in the period. However, it also meant that the lead was approaching 300. At this point, Surrey would have been looking to accelerate, but they were unable to do so. The next four moments which got Surrey’s supporters excited were the 300 lead, Sam Curran’s fifty, the team 200 and the 100 partnership. I had begun the session hopeful that we could take the final four wickets by the close, but Foakes and Sam Curran were able to ensure that no wickets fell during the session. Foakes brought up his fifty two overs before the close, while Curran ended a great day for him with a career best 71 not out. Surrey closed on 234-6 and are 356 ahead. Despite not taking an wickets, Murtagh helped keep the run rate down by conceding just 23 in his 18 overs.

I don’t think we have taken the second new ball despite it being available for the final over of the day, so I imagine we will be keen to take it first thing tomorrow and take the final few wickets in the same way as Surrey did with the second new ball this morning. Apart from a couple of points today, batting didn’t seem too difficult, so that will give us hope that we will be able to achieve whatever target Surrey set us or at least bat out the overs to secure a draw. We will also be buoyed by a couple of matches at Lord’s in previous years when batting on the final day has posed little difficulty. However, Surrey will hope that their bowlers can bowl us out, especially if the pitch favours Gareth Batty and Ansari