Cricket-Match-Special ... A forum for discussion

McLaren out early doors, still need 10 runs for a batting point, I'm not hopeful.

Made the batting point, hurrah.

Now to see what the Topleyless attack can make of the Warwickshire batters.

Fidel strikes, 3/1.

And again, 10/2.

Just a shame, a different left armer isn't operating at the other end.

Cue Tomlinson to take a wicket!

Could be tricky as two England internationals currently at the crease.

Spent the day down there. Not exactly the most thrilling of afternoons, but understandable from us given a) no Topley, and b) our low score and a day washed out meaning that the best we could realistically hope for would be a draw. Over after over of Dawson bowling it outside leg-stump, and Bell and Woakes just kicking it away.

I don't quite know what Warks' game plan was. I understand them needing to be cautious to start with, especially after falling to 10-2, because the last thing they'd have wanted was a batting performance akin to most of ours, and open the door ajar for us to win a low scoring thriller. But come late afternoon, when they were about 170, I thought they really should have pushed on a bit. An 80 run lead with four wickets left is a great position after two days, but we're after three days. The only way this game doesn't finish a draw now is if we bat horribly again next time round. There's simply not enough time for Warks to score enough runs to really extend this 80 run lead (to, say, 250 or 300) and then bowl us out by themselves. They would need our assistance in that.

Solid century from Bell, he was never, ever troubled except for one edge off McLaren when on 44 which fell short of slip. But too slow and scratchy if Warks were looking at forcing a win.

Doesn't look like we'll get a third bowling point, but hopefully it suggests batting out for a draw will be more straightforward.

budgetmeansbudget wrote:Doesn't look like we'll get a third bowling point, but hopefully it suggests batting out for a draw will be more straightforward.

Yeah, it probably now requires Warks to try and slog their way to 400 for us to get these two. And as I type, Bell does just that by slogging Tommo high into the air and getting caught.

(Given that they've passed 350, there's no reason for Warks to not at least and get to 400 within the next five and a bit overs)

And yep, there's the bonus point. Sounds like Patel came down to try and smash it out the ground, and totally missed.

st_brendy wrote:And yep, there's the bonus point. Sounds like Patel came down to try and smash it out the ground, and totally missed.

Blimey that all happened quickly.

Now to bat out the rest of the day!

budgetmeansbudget wrote:

st_brendy wrote:And yep, there's the bonus point. Sounds like Patel came down to try and smash it out the ground, and totally missed.

Blimey that all happened quickly.

Now to bat out the rest of the day!

Only got ourselves to blame if we don't. Less than 2.5 sessions left, blue skies, at the Rose Bowl.

10 overs down. 64 overs (I think) left.

(Although in all likelihood we'll overtake Warks score at the some point, if we're not bowled out before then, so you can deduct two overs from that should be get to a position where Warks bowl us out with a deficit to chase)

Woakes has a sore hamstring, so hasn't been able to bowl yet. If that continues for the rest of the innings, then it goes some way to levelling out us being without Topley yesterday.

Vince could do with a nice half century from here.

Two quick wickets, 66/3.

Vince gone. Warks' game now. This is so, so poor from the top order again. A repeat of the first inning, a repeat of last season.

st_brendy wrote:Vince gone. Warks' game now. This is so, so poor from the top order again. A repeat of the first inning, a repeat of last season.

Topley injured, the top order useless, looks like rooted to the bottom of the table for a while. And Vince demonstrates again why he isn't yet test quality.

Still hope that we can save the game, lower order did all the work first time around.