WITH Durham currently dominating opponents even more impressively than when they won the title by 47 points two years ago it must be galling to note that leaders Lancashire keep playing on result pitches.

Even with a depleted attack the Red Rose men are on their way to victory at the Rose Bowl, so ahead of their visit to Chester-le-Street on Sunday it is vital for Durham to keep turning the screw at Edgbaston.

They appear to be on their way to a second successive innings win with the hosts closing the second day on 186 for nine in reply to 602 for six declared.

The only hint of a growl from the Warwickshire Bears came after they had slumped to 31 for four. Helped by some wayward bowling from Ruel Brathwaite, who will surely make way for Graham Onions on Sunday, Varun Chopra and Darren Maddy added 86 in the next 12 overs.

It was a muck-or-nettles approach to a largely self-inflicted crisis and they got away with a few things, but Brathwaite, bowling short and wide of off stump, was left on too long in conceding 48 runs from six overs.

As soon as he was replaced by Callum Thorp the carnage ended as Maddy pushed forward to an away swinger and edged to first slip.

In Thorp's next over Chopra drove at a similar ball and edged to second slip, having made 79 of the 126 runs on the board at the time, which included 16 extras.

Having been wicketless at Worcester, that made it three for Thorp and Ben Stokes picked up the day's last three.

Rikki Clarke played round a ball which took out his leg stump and the young all-rounder pinned Tim Ambrose lbw with a ball which kept low before having Naqqash Tahir caught behind when driving well wide of off stump.

While Lancashire have won three times at Liverpool, Durham have played every match on a run-laden surface and, if Liam Plunkett and Mark Stoneman are included, they have nine batsmen averaging over 40.

Skipper Phil Mustard leads the way on 152.5 after making 71 not out yesterday before declaring when Ian Blackwell holed out at deep square leg for 99.

Dale Benkenstein averages 71.8 and his 128 made him the leading run scorer in the country with 718 until Marcus Trescothick overtook him yesterday afternoon.

Blackwell and Mustard thrashed 119 runs in just over an hour after lunch before the ex-Somerset man fell one run short of following Benkenstein to his third championship century of the season.

Blackwell could have pushed a Boyd Rankin long hop into leg-side spaces for a single, but being in overdrive he tried to pull it for his fifth six and holed out at deep square leg.

Steve Harmison and Thorp initially seemed to find no more encouragement from the pitch than the home bowlers. But left-hander Will Porterfield pushed forward to the last ball of the sixth over and edged Thorp to Scott Borthwick at third slip.

Mentally the Irishman was probably already on the plane to Dublin, having been given permission to leave this match after two days to captain his country in two one-day matches against Pakistan. Rankin goes with him with figures of two for 129.

Harmison, who kept going for 12 overs either side of tea, struck twice in two balls as batsmen three, four and five all made ducks.

Ian Westwood never looked happy in five overs at the crease and popped up a catch to Will Smith at short leg.

Off the first ball of Harmison's next over, the first one faced by Mohammad Yousuf, the Pakistani clipped a catch out of the middle of the bat straight to Borthwick at square leg.

With two catches already under his belt, the young all-rounder then swooped from cover to hit the non-striker's stumps and run out Jim Troughton.

Then came the brief fightback, with Chopra hitting 13 fours in his impressive 98-ball innings which suggested the pitch was still as full of runs as when Durham added 254 in 47 overs to their overnight 348 for three.

They comfortably achieved maximum batting points for the fourth time in seven games and two landmarks were passed as Smith and Benkenstein added 51 in the first ten overs.

After resuming on 90, Benkenstein clipped Naqqash Tahir to the mid-wicket boundary in the first over and later ran him to third man for three to complete his 20th first-class century for Durham off 183 balls.

Shortly afterwards Smith cut Rankin for four to break Durham's record fourth-wicket stand of 250, set by Benkenstein and Paul Collingwood at Derby in 2005.

The stand was worth 273 when Smith fell for 179 - a dismissal which owed everything to a brilliant piece of anticipation by Clarke.

Smith tried to paddle left-arm spinner Chris Metters to fine leg and probably thought he had succeeded. But he got it a little too fine and Clarke nipped across from slip to leg slip to take a remarkable, tumbling catch.

Blackwell opened up by driving the next ball to the extra cover boundary and although Benkenstein gave Metters a simple return catch the sixth-wicket pair fed voraciously on some very tasty offerings from a side who were level with Durham at the start but will probably take only one point from the match.

SCORECARD

Warwickshire v Durham
At Edgbaston.
Overnight: Durham 348-3 (W R Smith 153
no, D M Benkenstein 90 no).
Durham First Innings
W R Smith c Clarke b Metters 179
D M Benkenstein c & b Metters 128
I D Blackwell c Westwood b Rankin 99
P Mustard not out 71
Extras (b7 lb11 nb34 pens 0) 52
Total 6 wkts dec (143.1 overs) 602
Fall: 1-36 2-68 3-127 4-400 5-439 6-602
Did Not Bat: S G Borthwick, C D Thorp, R
M R Brathwaite, S J Harmison.
Score at 130 overs: 5-501
Bonus Pts: Warwickshire 1 Durham 5
Bowling: Tahir 34-7-128-1. Rankin 24.1-1-
129-2. Clarke 30-7-105-1. Metters 28-4-
128-2. Maddy 25-5-81-0. Westwood 2-0-
13-0.

Warwickshire First Innings Close
V Chopra c Di Venuto b Thorp 79
W T Porterfield c Borthwick b Thorp 4
I J Westwood c W R Smith b S J Harmison 0
Mohammad Yousuf c Borthwick b S J Harmison 0
J O Troughton run out 0
D L Maddy c Muchall b Thorp 27
R Clarke b Stokes 5
T R Ambrose lbw b Stokes 13
N Tahir c Mustard b Stokes 21
C L Metters not out 11
W B Rankin retd hurt 2
Extras (lb9 w5 nb10 pens 0) 24
Total 9 wkts (46 overs) 186
Fall: 1-18 2-29 3-29 4-31 5-117 6-126 7-132
8-162 9-180
To Bat: K H D Barker, A S Miller.
Bonus Pts: Warwickshire 1 Durham 5
Bowling: S J Harmison 16-4-41-2. Thorp 9-
1-35-3. Borthwick 4-1-5-0. Brathwaite 6-0-
48-0. Stokes 11-1-48-3.