Surrey and Hampshire deliver nail-biting victories in county cricket.

Hampshire defeated Yorkshire to maintain pressure on Surrey, who prevailed against Somerset to maintain first place.

Ball one: Burns’ men continue their winning streak.
In a week favorable for red-ball cricket, the County Championship match between Surrey and Somerset entered its 12th session with the resourceful Somerset side nipping at Surrey’s heels.

After dismissing the hosts for 180, Rory Burns likely believed that one good partnership would put the leaders in front and two would put them in a position to win. As Hashim Amla was unable to continue (it was an unusual match in which one Overton concussed the other), the captain, the overseas signing, and Ben Geddes put together a second-wicket partnership of 136. After Will Jacks and Jordan Clark added 86 for the sixth wicket, Somerset trailed by approximately 200 runs with nearly half the match remaining.

This season, however, pitches are not deteriorating (or perhaps, in Surrey’s case, spinners are not being selected), and Lewis Goldsworthy and Lewis Gregory brought their team level before Peter Siddle demonstrated that he has lost none of his tenacity at age 37. Jacks and Clark picked up where they left off the first time around, and Overton was at the crease when the winning runs were scored. Surrey was still 39 runs short with half of its batting order back in the pavilion. Surrey continues to reign supreme.

Ball two: Hill is the stumbling block as Hampshire battles to victory.
Hampshire remained within striking distance of the unbeaten leaders after a tighter home victory over Yorkshire (whose players should be commended for retaining focus in the circumstances).

After the visitors had amassed 428 runs, the victory appeared unlikely, despite 21-year-old George Hill scoring 131 from the second slot. James Vince was at the crease when his team trailed by 12 runs, and he knew his batters would need to perform to stay in the game. They did so, with all but his No. 11 scoring at least 30 runs to keep the game close.

The experienced seam trio of Keith Barker, Kyle Abbott, and Brad Wheal took three wickets apiece, leaving each Tyke batsman with 197 runs to score. Liam Dawson, whose spin had not taken a wicket, and Nick Gubbins stuck to the old-school strategy of scoring quickly, scoring a total of 109 runs off 110 balls, but it was the wise old heads of Barker, James Fuller, and Abbott (over 100 years between them) who brought home the points.

Ball three: Wells digs deep in long chase Despite losing several of their stars to England’s Test and One-Day International squads, Lancashire hung on to the top two’s coattails with an impressive chase in a one-innings match at Edgbaston.

Dane Vilas needed 329 runs in just over a day to win the match after Alex Davies scored a century for Warwickshire against his former teammates. A day earlier, such a target appeared daunting, but perhaps things have changed since the introduction of McCullumism in English cricket.

Luke Wells, in a slump of indifferent form, and Rob Jones, in only his second championship match, were the unlikely Red Rose counterparts to England’s Jonny Bairstow and Ben Stokes. This was not a charging flurry of sixes and fours, but rather a calculated accumulation that maintained the required rate and protected the late middle order from being exposed too soon. Wells’ 175 in just under seven hours was cricket as it was traditionally played, and it was no less effective for it.

After chasing in the first inning, the Notts tie the game with a simple win on ball four.
In Division Two, Nottinghamshire’s victory over Leicestershire and Middlesex’s loss to Derbyshire resulted in a 20-point swing, enough to propel the Midlanders to the top of the standings.

It was yet another instance of a recurring motif this season. As a result of fulfilling the request to make it more difficult for bowlers to hit good areas at just below 80 mph and wait for the ball to jag this way and that, grounds staff receive a routine 4-75.

Ben Slater and Haseeb Hameed walked to the crease with the Grace Road scoreboard indicating that they were over 400 runs behind. However, after another fine knock from Ben Duckett and plenty of support down the order (even Extras were within a run of scoring a half-century), their counterparts, Hasan Azad and Rishi Patel, took guard a second time over 100 runs behind, which must have been a little soul-crushing.

Liam Patterson-White, one of the early season’s brightest stars, added four-second innings wickets to the three he captured in the first innings, and the visitors traveled the short distance home having secured an innings victory – something that did not occur frequently after conceding 440 runs before lunch on Day Two.

Five: The past is a foreign nation.
Older readers (am I fooling myself into thinking there are others?) may remember the days of the John Player League, with its shortened run-ups, Peter Walker on the gantry, and 40 overs per side – still the ideal format for a Sunday afternoon match.

Jim Laker would describe a target of 200 as “a little bit of work” and Richie Benaud would keep an eye on the required run rate, cautioning that the batting side would not want it to exceed one run per ball.

Last week at Chelmsford, Essex scored 244-7 in 20 overs, and Sussex, led by Ravi Bopara and abandoning their inner Gavaskar, made a valiant effort, returning to familiar territory. The 40 overs produced 477 runs but fell 11 short of a tie. Peter, Richie, and Jim are nodding in the direction of Fred Trueman, who is saying, “I don’t know what’s happening out there.”

Rehan executes a Rashid-style six-ball play.
The search for effective English spinners continues – hint: try the ones who spin the ball the most – with Adil Rashid’s fragile shoulder contributing as much to England’s success in white-ball cricket as Jos Buttler’s powerful bat.

Notably, Leicestershire’s 17-year-old leg-spinner Rehan Ahmed came on immediately after the powerplay, defending a target of 158, and took four wickets in the crucial middle overs for just 22 runs, Durham collapsing for a meager 106.

He is just beginning his career, but Leicestershire’s confidence in him is being repaid. Having participated in all 11 matches, he leads their bowling averages with 14 wickets at an economy rate just above seven.

If necessary, we should insert Liam Livingstone into the Test XI as a sort of super bowler, but he is not the future of English spin; Ahmed and Sussex’s Archie Lenham, both 17 years old, are. Why can’t spinners attack as aggressively as batters?