How did we draw that?

By Haringey Racer
April 24 2017

Harngey Racer describes in great detail of the final day in freezing weather, a frozen scoreboard and a cold feeling at the end.  

Middlesex v Essex, County Championship, Day 4 

At the start of day four the equation was simple. With 96 overs nominally available Essex required an unlikely 433 more runs to win, Middlesex 10 wickets. The Middlesex over rate of -2 also needed to be corrected. The weather forecast, however, suggested that a full day’s play was unlikely with heavy cloud predicted for much of the day, rain due later and temperatures down on previous days. It was therefore obvious that early breakthroughs would help matters considerably.

Play started on time in front of a slightly above average fourth day crowd and it quickly became apparent, in the upper Compton Stand, at least, that the temperature forecast was correct and with the wind coming from over the Warner Stand it was bloody freezing. Tim Murtagh opened the bowling from the Nursery End and the first significant point of interest was that Oliie Rayner wasn’t fielding in the slips, I assume because his strapped-up left hand was deemed not to be up to the task or in need of protection. 

Within a couple of minutes light drizzle was falling which rapidly became heavy enough to drive the players from the fields after the second over, bowled by Toby Roland-Jones. The rain also seemed to have got into the big scoreboards which had frozen on 1.3 overs leaving only the manual one updating. The delay was mercifully brief and play resumed with the loss of just two overs. Quite a few spectators took advantage of the break to move to the more sheltered climes of the Grand Stand. The early breakthrough came in the fourth over of the morning when Murtagh swung the ball through the gate to demolish Nick Browne’s stumps.

At this stage the conditions were certainly helping the bowlers but Alistair Cook was taking advantage of anything loose and starting to look ominously set. Steve Finn replaced Roland-Jones from the Pavilion End and soon induced an inside edge from Tom Westley that just missed his stumps. By now the scoreboards had dried out and were showing the correct score but with a blank where the over rate should have been. I can confidently say that we hadn’t cleared the deficit by this point and, sure enough, the figure of -2 soon reappeared and worsened to -3 in no time at all.

Toby Roland-Jones switched to the Nursery End and almost immediately saw Cook play and miss twice in a row. Finn and Roland-Jones were now finding their rhythm and drying up the runs until Finn strayed onto Westley’s legs and was clipped for four. In the next over Roland-Jones pinned Westley lbw to one that kept low, although the low bounce was exaggerated by the batsman playing back rather than forward. That made the score 74-2 at the end of a wicket maiden. Ollie Rayner came on at the Pavilion end. His third ball was played firmly by Cook but Sam Robson took a very sharp catch at short leg. 74-3 and game very much on. This started a spell of very tight bowling from Rayner – who bowled 5 successive maidens leading up to lunch – and first Roland-Jones then Murtagh. Between them the three bowled ten overs for ten runs in the run-up to lunch, which was taken at 84 for 3 with Dan Lawrence and Ravi Bopara at the crease.

After lunch the light was much better and the over rate improved to zero. Finn and Rayner resumed their attack and continued the tight bowling of the pre-lunch period, giving the batsmen very few opportunities to score or to leave the ball. In the ninth over of the afternoon Lawrence edged Finn to first slip where Adam Voges very nearly spilled a straightforward catch, finally grabbing it at the third, increasingly desperate, attempt. 100-4, although by now the runs were completely immaterial. Four overs later Roland-Jones replaced Finn and his fourth ball was edged by Adam Wheater, who had already edged just short of the slips twice in the over, to Dawid Malan at fourth slip. Five down, 52 overs left.

By now the clouds were starting to gather again and the light had deteriorated to the extent that the umpires took a light reading before the start of a Roland-Jones over. He immediately caused Ryan ten Doeschate to play and miss which in turn saw Finn brought in to fifth slip (Rayner still protecting his hand at mid-on). I’d love to be able to say that ten Doeschate immediately edged to Finn but he didn’t. He edged the next-but-one ball to third slip where Captain Franklin took the catch. Six down, 48 overs to go, but the light getting even worse. The batsmen survived with the occasional scare, particularly when Bopara abled a single for a push off Rayner to the cover boundary and was very nearly beaten by the throw. More discussions about the light saw Malan brought on to try to keep the players on the field but at the end of his over the umpires decided it was too dark even for spin and took the players off just before 3.10 at which point an early tea was taken.

The darkness finally lifted sufficiently for a restart at 4.15 with 30 overs remaining in the day. Finn opened up and with his second ball (or his third after Bopara backed away just as he entered his delivery stride and he completed the delivery while Ian Gould called dead ball) he nipped one back to Bopara and removed the off stump. Seven down, 29.4 overs to go. Simon Harmer and Neil Wagner then defended stoutly, although not without alarms particularly when Finn dug a few in short to Wagner who fended them off without much idea of where they were going.

By now they had survived 15 overs and the light had worsened to the extent that while the umpires consulted Dawid Malan ostentatiously stood at the bowler’s end spinning the ball from hand to hand. That was enough to persuade them to stay on and with his first ball he took the wicket of Harmer, lbw. However only one over more was possible before the umpires took the players off with thirteen overs left. And, apart from a false dawn when the light briefly improved but worsened again as soon as the umpires came out to look, that was that.