Hard pounding
It is a sunny, breezy morning, but as I arrive at Edgbaston, it doesn’t have the feel of one of the most important games - for both sides - in the country’s most prestigious cricket competition: an almost pathetically small crowd, scattered thinly around Edgbaston’s all-embracing stands, a pitch so far over to one side of the ground that the boundary to the Hollies stand is barely 50 yards, and a vast media centre which, 15 minutes before the start of play, has precisely one occupant, Somerset’s website and social media guru, Ben Warren. I know there’s a Test match going on down the road in London, but this is ridiculous.
Somerset are without their two best bowlers and Tom Abell loses the toss.The shadow of Jeetan Patel in the fourth innings already looms over our chances of securing a much-needed win. But the wicket of Dominic Sibley, the Championship’s leading run-scorer with 940 to his name, in just the second over, smartly caught in the gully by Roelof van der Merwe off a good ball from Jack Brooks, seems to be just the start that Somerset need. Sibley, and Sam Hain apart, this looks like a fragile, inexperienced Warwickshire batting line-up.
But that proves to be the only wicket of the morning session, in which Will Rhodes and 19 year-old Rob Yates make steady progress on a dry, easy-paced pitch. Rather as at Headingley, the bowling lacks the iron discipline necessary to frustrate batsmen into mistakes on a benign surface.
Indeed, in the first hour after lunch, Warwickshire seem almost to be running away with the game. But then Rhodes chases a wide half-volley from Craig Overton, Sam Hain arrives to take his place and the runs dry up. From 158/2 at the end of the 41st over, Warwickshire reach tea at 200/2 - so 42 runs in 23 overs, Hain on 13 from 70 balls. Even Tom Abell is bowling maidens. Hain puts me in mind of the mills of God. Like them, he grinds slowly, but exceeding sure, and he always seems to do it when I’m watching!
But today, after eking out 25 painstaking runs from 104 deliveries, he pushes loosely at van der Merwe and Steve Davies takes a neat catch. Thank goodness for that! “The best thing about that innings is that it’s over”, I say, rather unkindly, on commentary. Meanwhile Rob Yates has reached a maiden first-class century. It is a proper red-ball innings, every ball played on its merits, no getting carried away, even after he’s reached his 100. Not a thing of beauty maybe, but for young Rob it will surely be a joy forever.
There is one more wicket to celebrate: that of Adam Hose, once of Somerset, who betrays a familiar frailty in going after the wrong ball from Craig Overton to be LBW. Tim Ambrose survives a close - VERY close - LBW shout to the accurate and probing van der Merwe, who fully justifies the decision to prefer him to Tim Groenewald, but he and a weary Yates make it to the close at 303/4.
Jason Kerr says he’s frustrated rather than disappointed at the close. The bowlers have stuck to their task well - “for the most part” - on an unresponsive pitch and - something that coaches always say when the opposition have had the better of a day’s play - “Warwickshire have batted very well”. For me, it’s been a day that feels uncomfortably like the first day at Headingley a month ago. But pessimism begone! There’s a long way to go.
I’m writing this in a quirky pub in the Jewellery Quarter called “1000 Trades”. Sitting at the bar as I arrived was a six foot tall, broad-shouldered transgender person in black lace, a flounced skirt and a tightly-laced bodice, wearing pink high heels and a pinkish blonde wig. Not the sort of customer one might expect to encounter in Eli’s, I reflect!
Somerset are without their two best bowlers and Tom Abell loses the toss.The shadow of Jeetan Patel in the fourth innings already looms over our chances of securing a much-needed win. But the wicket of Dominic Sibley, the Championship’s leading run-scorer with 940 to his name, in just the second over, smartly caught in the gully by Roelof van der Merwe off a good ball from Jack Brooks, seems to be just the start that Somerset need. Sibley, and Sam Hain apart, this looks like a fragile, inexperienced Warwickshire batting line-up.
But that proves to be the only wicket of the morning session, in which Will Rhodes and 19 year-old Rob Yates make steady progress on a dry, easy-paced pitch. Rather as at Headingley, the bowling lacks the iron discipline necessary to frustrate batsmen into mistakes on a benign surface.
Indeed, in the first hour after lunch, Warwickshire seem almost to be running away with the game. But then Rhodes chases a wide half-volley from Craig Overton, Sam Hain arrives to take his place and the runs dry up. From 158/2 at the end of the 41st over, Warwickshire reach tea at 200/2 - so 42 runs in 23 overs, Hain on 13 from 70 balls. Even Tom Abell is bowling maidens. Hain puts me in mind of the mills of God. Like them, he grinds slowly, but exceeding sure, and he always seems to do it when I’m watching!
But today, after eking out 25 painstaking runs from 104 deliveries, he pushes loosely at van der Merwe and Steve Davies takes a neat catch. Thank goodness for that! “The best thing about that innings is that it’s over”, I say, rather unkindly, on commentary. Meanwhile Rob Yates has reached a maiden first-class century. It is a proper red-ball innings, every ball played on its merits, no getting carried away, even after he’s reached his 100. Not a thing of beauty maybe, but for young Rob it will surely be a joy forever.
There is one more wicket to celebrate: that of Adam Hose, once of Somerset, who betrays a familiar frailty in going after the wrong ball from Craig Overton to be LBW. Tim Ambrose survives a close - VERY close - LBW shout to the accurate and probing van der Merwe, who fully justifies the decision to prefer him to Tim Groenewald, but he and a weary Yates make it to the close at 303/4.
Jason Kerr says he’s frustrated rather than disappointed at the close. The bowlers have stuck to their task well - “for the most part” - on an unresponsive pitch and - something that coaches always say when the opposition have had the better of a day’s play - “Warwickshire have batted very well”. For me, it’s been a day that feels uncomfortably like the first day at Headingley a month ago. But pessimism begone! There’s a long way to go.
I’m writing this in a quirky pub in the Jewellery Quarter called “1000 Trades”. Sitting at the bar as I arrived was a six foot tall, broad-shouldered transgender person in black lace, a flounced skirt and a tightly-laced bodice, wearing pink high heels and a pinkish blonde wig. Not the sort of customer one might expect to encounter in Eli’s, I reflect!
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