County Championship Race Going to the Wire

A round of county championship fixtures took place this week, starting on Monday and ending on Thursday. Days two and four were thus work days for me, limiting what I actually got to hear about at the time. The big tie of the round was between second place Somerset and leaders Surrey. In county championship fixtures there are 16 points for a win, eight points for a draw and no points for a loss, with each side able to earn up to eight bonus points. These points, awarded in the first 110 overs of each team’s first innings are slightly lopsidedly awarded, five for batting and three for bowling. The bowling points are awarded for taking three, six and then nine wickets, the batting points for reaching scores of 250, 300, 350, 400 and 450. This post now looks back at the Taunton summit meeting with these extra details in mind.

THE FIRST TWO INNINGS

When Surrey arrived in Taunton they were 24 points clear of Somerset, meaning that a win would effectively close the deal on their third successive title, a draw would still leave them firm favourites and a defeat would open the race right up, though unless Somerset took a maximum of 24 points (16+8 as described in the introduction) and Surrey 0 the visitors would still be at the top of the table. Somerset batted first, and their first innings was precisely contained within the first day, their last wicket falling on the stroke of time with their score at 317. Tom Banton made a superb 132 and there were useful supporting contributions from Tom Abell, Archie Vaughan (son of Michael, and there will be much more about him later in this piece) and James Rew. Shakib Al Hasan, at Surrey on the most temporary of temporary contracts, claimed four wickets and Daniel Worrall three. This, since the innings was done inside 110 overs, meant that Somerset took two batting points and Surrey a full haul of three bowling points.

When I was able to join the coverage on day two it looked like Somerset were headed for a big first innings advantage – Surrey were almost 100 adrift and had only three wickets standing. However at this point Tom Curran, playing his first first class match in almost two years (he is a white ball specialist, and has played plenty of high level limited overs cricket in that period) proceeded to swing things back towards Surrey, ending with a score of 86 off 75 balls, and getting Surrey to 321. Archie Vaughan had 6-102 with his off spin, and veteran left arm spinner Jack Leach had 4-105, having wheeled through 48.2 overs. Although Surrey had faced over 110 overs in total they had passed 300 before the end of the 110th, and Somerset had got them nine down by the end of the 110th, so with the game now a one innings shoot out each side had claimed a total of five bonus points. This meant that there were now three possible final points scenarios at the end of the match: Surrey lead by 40 if they win, Surrey lead by 24 in the event of a draw and Surrey lead by eight if Somerset win.

THE SECOND HALF OF THE MATCH

Tom Banton was injured and not expected to bat for Somerset in their second innings. Surrey worked their way through the Somerset second innings. At 153-9 it looked like they had a decent chance, but then to general surprise (and not a little criticism on social media) the injured Banton hobbled out to the middle to join Craig Overton. By the end of a truncated day this pair had extended the Somerset score to 194. I was to find out that they had added a further 30 on the final morning before Banton was out for 46, leaving Overton unbeaten on 49. Jack Leach and Archie Vaughan set to work on getting through Surrey for a second time. When I checked in on the score at Fakenham library it looked like time was Somerset’s enemy – Surrey were three wickets down at that point, with Sibley and Foakes batting together, and only two hours or thereabouts left. By the time I got home Surrey were nine down and desperately trying to bat out time for the draw. With the final ball of the 78th over, and almost certainly time only for one more over after it had the wicket not fallen, Leach got one on to Worrall’s pads and the umpire raised the finger to confirm that it was LBW. County Championship games are not generally televised, and this one wasn’t, so even if it might have saved him Worrall had no recourse to DRS and Somerset could start celebrating as soon as that finger went up. Surrey were all out for 109, giving Somerset victory by 111 runs. Jack Leach had 5-37 for that final innings, and young Archie Vaughan had the other five, for only one run more, giving him 11-140 in the match as well as that first innings 44. This was a classic match, and even as someone who grew up in south London, a short trip along the Northern line from The Oval, I say without hesitation that the final result was a good one not just for Somerset, but for the County Championship, which is now a genuine contest at the top, and indeed for the game of cricket. Full scorecard here.

PHOTOGRAPHS

My usual sign off…