Day Two
Yorkshire v Somerset
LV County Championship

YORKSHIRE believe that a lack of luck is the only thing that stands between them and a winning position at the halfway stage of their LV County Championship match against Somerset at Headingley.

After the hosts declared their first innings on 505-9 in the latter stages of yesterday’s second afternoon, the scoreboard suggests the men from Taunton made a steady response to that total with 92- 1 from 43 overs.

But Yorkshire bowled superbly, and they will bowl a lot worse at other stages this season for far more reward.

They had a handful of appeals for lbw and caught behind turned down against Marcus Trescothick and Nick Compton, who notched 53 and 33 not out respectively.

But the former and current England players survived for the majority to leave the White Rose with a lot of hard work to do during today’s third day and tomorrow’s fourth if they are win their third match on the bounce.

Rich Pyrah only conceded six runs in his first eight overs of his Championship season, and was convinced he had Compton caught.

The all-rounder had scored an aggressive 55 off 54 balls earlier in the day, partnering Adil Rashid on the way to a career best 180.

He said: “I don’t think we’ve bowled as well as that for a long time. On another day, they could have been 90-6 quite easily. If we bowl like we did, there’s no reason why we can’t bowl them out in the morning.

“The way we bowled against two of the best players in the country, we just need a bit of luck.”

Jack Brooks was the sole wicket-taker in the latter stages of the day, trapping Trescothick lbw the ball after he reached his 50.

Day two was another memorable one for Rashid, whose 180 off 317 balls saw him tot up 4,000 runs in first-class cricket.

The 25-year-old’s departure, caught behind off Peter Trego, signalled the declaration in the latter stages of the afternoon after he was involved in half-century stands with Andrew Hodd, Pyrah and Brooks.

Rashid started the day on 120, and he was not as fluent as he was on day one. Having shared 207 with Gary Ballance for the fifth wicket on Tuesday, he added 88 for the sixth with Hodd, 79 for the eighth with Pyrah and 55 for the ninth with Brooks.

Pyrah hit four fours in an over off Jack Leach just after lunch to give Yorkshire an outside chance of claiming the maximum of five batting bonus points for reaching 400 inside 110 overs, which they fell only five runs short of.

Brooks hit successive sixes over long-on and mid-wicket off Leach.

SCORECARD

Yorkshire v Somerset
At Headingley Carnegie.
Overnight: Yorkshire 332-5 (A U Rashid 120
no, G S Ballance 107).

Yorkshire First Innings
A U Rashid c Buttler b Trego ..............180
A J Hodd c Buttler b Kirby ....................27
T T Bresnan lbw b Trego ...................... 0
R M Pyrah b Overton ..........................55
J A Brooks not out .............................33
Extras (b15 lb10 nb11 pens 0) ......36
Total 9 wkts dec (135.4 overs) ....505
Fall: 1-0 2-17 3-71 4-75 5-282 6-370 7-
371 8-450 9-505
Did Not Bat: S A Patterson.
Bowling: Trego 33.4-8-107-4. Kirby 30-4-
119-3. Thomas 26-3-81-1. Overton 19-0-
89-1. Leach 22-3-76-0. Suppiah 5-1-8-0.

Somerset First Innings Close
M E Trescothick lbw b Brooks .............53
N R Compton not out .........................33
M J Leach not out .............................. 2
Extras (lb4 pens 0).....................4
Total 1 wkt (43 overs) ..............92
Fall: 1-90
To Bat: A N Petersen, J C Hildreth, J C
Buttler, P D Trego, A V Suppiah, S P Kirby,
A C Thomas, J Overton
Bowling: Bresnan 15-6-35-0. Brooks 11-4-
30-1. Pyrah 8-5-6-0. Patterson 9-2-17-0.