Yesterday Durham beat Middlesex at Lord's for only the third time in a championship game. I had spent the first two days there, travelling home on Wednesday evening but I believe Tony was there yesterday and if so we can expect a fuller report from him in due course. Suffice to say it was a low scoring game with all four innings completed without two hundred being reached by either side. At lunch yesterday Middlesex looked favourites but we reckoned without Brydon Carse who after lunch took 5 for 11 in 4.4 overs. Surrey thought to be showing interest .
The win took Durham up to third place although this is not likely to last much beyond lunch today by which time Northants should have beaten Leicestershire, a win that will lift them into the promotion places. Durham go to Wantage Road on Monday on the back of an unbeaten run of eight matches. I am listening to the other game still in progress in Division Two where at Bristol Gloucestershire seem to be in a hurry to lose to Sussex. This will make the situation at the top of the division very close as we go into the last two rounds of matches.
The statistic with which I began the posting, namely that yesterday's win was only Durham's third in St John's Wood was quoted several times yesterday afternoon but without the additional information as to when the other two victories had occurred. One stuck in my mind because I attended on the second day and it finished in most dramatic way. It was played in the first week in June 1998 and Durham won by one wicket with Melvyn Betts hitting 'Tuffers' for six in the penultimate over and then running three off the next ball with 'rising star' Steve Harmison. The win took Durham up to the then dizzy heights of second in the table but it was to be their last win of the season and they finished fourteenth, at that time their highest placing.
Durham's second win at Lord's came in more recent times for we only have to go back to this time of the year in 2014 when Durham overcame their hosts by 141 runs. 176 for Scott Borthwick was the highlight of the Durham batting and Malan got 97 for Middlesex. I wasn't present on that occasion opting instead for three glorious days at Trent Bridge when Yorkshire clinched the championship. Durham finished fifth and Middlesex seventh.
Perhaps a little of the gloss has gone off Monday's game at Headingley given the events at Taunton yesterday but assuming the key to the red ball cupboard can be found it will be nice to welcome back championship cricket to Headingley after a two month absence. Kent, fresh from mauling the hapless Notts yesterday will be formidable opponents. In the meantime I will be at Richmondshire tomorrow when the champions of the NYSD take on Yorkshire Premier North winners Sheriff Hutton Bridge. The Richmond website confirms wickets pitched 11:00.
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