Gurney strikes but Surrey build lead

Date: Wednesday 17 June 2009

Leicestershire 165 (New 44, Dippenaar 39, Dernbach 6-47, Jordan 3-54) trail Surrey 217-2 (Ramprakash 85, Brown 82*) by 52 runs, with Surrey having eight wickets in hand.

Surrey remain in control of the Championship game with Leicestershire after a rain-affected day two, but County again made the visitors work for their runs.

Harry Gurney claimed the key wicket of Mark Ramprakash in the evening session, but Surrey progressed to 217-2 by stumps, with an overall lead of 52 with eight wickets in hand.

Play was able to start on time but only 36 overs were possible during a horrible day that was affected by a howling wind, rain and bad light.

County can be pleased with their bowling effort throughout, with Gurney gaining a good wicket and the other three frontline bowlers sending down controlled spells which deserved better reward.

Claude Henderson caused problems with turn and bounce, Jim Allenby nagged away and swung the ball, and AJ Harris and Gurney bowled with good pace, swing and carry.

In total, only 96 runs were added during proceedings and the majority of play came in the opening session.

21.2 of those overs were bowled before lunch, in which time Surrey moved to 179-1, with Michael Brown and Ramprakash extending their stand to an unbroken 121.

Rain then prompted an early lunch and the players then returned to the field at 4.45pm.

In the final passage of play, Ramprakash was caught by 'keeper Tom New for 85 from a jaffa sent down by Gurney, which ended a stand of 158.

County had threatened plenty after the resumption, with Brown surviving a huge leg-before shout by Allenby and also being put down by HD Ackerman from a sharp chance at slip off Henderson.

However, the batsman continued to battle on and was unbeaten on 82 from 245 deliveries by the end of play.

Earlier, during the first period, both batsmen negated the threat of the bowlers in making patient half-centuries, with accumulation rather than acceleration being the order of the day.

Brown and Ramprakash were content to defend well and put away the bad ball, with Brown playing one particularly nice flick off his toes through mid-wicket.

Ramprakash also employed a risk-free strategy, and when Harris did find the batsman's edge with some good movement, the ball flew through the vacant third slip region.

Brown was first to his fifty, which came from 155 balls with five fours. Ramprakash found the boundary on three occasions in his half-century, which was bought up from his 117th delivery.

The fifty completed a remarkable statistic for the batsman. Ramprakash has now passed fifty in 15 of his 20 first-class innings against Leicestershire, scoring more than 1,450 runs at an average of just under 86.

The batsman fell around that average mark as Gurney extracted good bounce and movement, and full credit should go to Ramprakash who walked following New's catch.

Captain Mark Butcher (0*) then saw his side through to a premature close because of bad light, with his team still holding all of the aces in the game despite County's best efforts.