IT WAS not so much the gulf between the two divisions which undermined Durham yesterday as the unexpected inclusion of Shaun Pollock in the Warwickshire ranks at the Riverside.

The visitors are under orders from the South African board not to overwork Pollock, and the intention was to leave him out of National League games.

But Warwickshire have made such a poor start in division one of the championship they were desperate for a victory yesterday and Pollock provided it.

Even though the pitch was too slow for his explosive talents to be seen to best advantage he hit the game's only sixes and took the first three Durham wickets for 12 runs.

Chasing Warwickshire's 207 for seven, Durham rallied from 22 for three through a stand of 58 between Martin Love and Jon Lewis.

But the threat of Pollock returning to the attack meant they had to press on and the sudden loss of four wickets for eight runs - three of them stumped by Keith Piper - left them in a hopeless position.

It became 109 for eight before an unbeaten 31 by Mark Davies took Durham to 167 for nine at the close, still 44 runs adrift.

Pollock's efforts apart, Durham's elevation to division one of the National League provided no great surge of quality as the pitch yielded runs too grudgingly for fans to be treated to a barrage of boundaries.

Batting at number three, Pollock scratched around for two overs before getting off the mark with a lofted four just short of the rope at mid-wicket, then hit successive balls from Ian Hunter for six.

Hunter went very close to having Pollock lbw for nought, but in his next over he was pulled behind square then driven straight back over his head.

A full toss was also driven wide of mid-off for four, but Pollock was then well caught by Mark Davies at mid-on for 25.

As the other Warwickshire batsmen mustered no sixes and only 11 fours, Pollock's brief onslaught was easily the highlight of an innings underpinned by a one-day best score of 72 by 20-year-old Ian Bell.

Indifferent early season form had persuaded the selectors that Bell was not quite ready for a Test call-up against the Sri Lankans, but on this evidence it is a missed opportunity.

There were only two fours in Bell's 85-ball half-century, one of them flying narrowly over mid-off, but he showed superb judgement of a run as he worked the ball around for ones and twos.

He followed the example of Nick Knight, often a dashing one-day batsman, who seemed to decide after the early loss of skipper Michael Powell that steady accumulation was called for.

Knight had made eight when he went for a big hit off Hunter and sliced the ball just short of third man, persuading him to adopt the more cautious approach which took him to 40 off 64 balls.

He then popped up a catch for Lewis at short extra cover off Mark Davies, leaving Bell to take over the mantle of supervising the steady acceleration towards 200.

Jim Troughton, grandson of former Doctor Who actor Patrick Troughton, was too anxious to propel the innings into a different time warp and holed out at long-on.

But Bell found a like-minded partner in the swift-running Trevor Penney and their relentless scampering helped them put on 69 in 13 overs.

Once past 50 Bell began to reverse sweep spinners Graeme Bridge and Michael Gough, one such stroke bringing him his fourth four before he fell in the 43rd over, lifting Paul Collingwood to long-off.

A Collingwood in-swinger breached Penney's attempted big hit in the final over, but nine runs in five balls from Neil Smith ensured the Bears passed 200.

This always looked likely to be too many for Durham once Pollock had struck in his second, third and sixth overs.

Gary Pratt was out pushing forward and edging to the wicketkeeper, Nicky Peng was adjudged lbw playing down the line of leg stump and Collingwood edged a checked drive to give Piper another catch.

Love was well on the way to repairing the damage before he departed for 36, lbw playing across the line in Smith's second over.

In his next over the off-spinner lured both Lewis and Andrew Pratt down the pitch to give Piper two simple stumpings, and his third came from a niftier piece of work when Gough got in a tangle against Ashley Giles.

The defiance of Bridge and Davies was in a lost cause and fans hoping for division one fireworks were streaming out in disappointment well before the end.