County Championship 2022. Division 1. Warwickshire v Somerset. 12^th, 13^th, 14^th and 15^th September 2022. Edgbaston.

Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II died on 8th September. Before the start of the first day a one minute silence was held in her honour.

Jack Leach was unavailable for selection by Somerset due to being on international duty and Craig Overton had not fully recovered from his injury.

Warwickshire. D.P. Sibley, A.L. Davies, R.M. Yates, W.M.H. Rhodes (c), S.R. Hain, Y. Yadav, M.G.K. Burgess (w), D.R. Briggs, H.J.H. Brookes, M. Siraj, O.J. Hannon-Dalby.

Somerset. T.A. Lammonby, Iman-ul-Haq, T.B. Abell (c), G.A. Bartlett, L. P. Goldsworthy, J.E.K. Rew (w), L. Gregory, K.L. Aldridge, J.H. Davey, Sajid Khan, J.A. Brooks.

Toss. Somerset. Elected to bat.

First day 12^th September – Gregory and Khan raise the spirits

The day began with the players, coaches and officials lined up facing the Pavilion. The two or three hundred people in the crowd, there were no more to my eye, joining them as respects were paid to the late Queen Elizabeth II. A short statement was read before a perfectly observed minute’s silence was held. The silence, a passing lorry apart, was palpable. Every minute’s silence I have witnessed being observed by a Championship crowd, even ones more than ten times the size of this one, is the same. Not a person moves. Not a syllable is spoken. This morning, for that minute, peace and intensely quiet contemplation reigned.

And then, the day moved quietly into the cricket. Oliver Hannon-Dalby bowled the first over to Tom Lammonby. No appeals disturbed the peace, no runs disturbed the scoreboard. From beyond the boundary the pitch looked uniformly brown, the sky looked uniformly grey, and the outfield displayed cricket’s ageless alternate stripes of bright and dull green. It was cricket in England, autumnal cricket to mark the modern age to be sure, but as restful as it would have been at the start of the latest Elizabethan age. Were it not for the expanse of the modern sports stadium that Edgbaston has become and the quality of the cricket, the start might have had the ambience of a league cricket match in the backwoods of any of the 18 shires that form the first-class game in this country. I quietly watched it all unfold from the heights of the square of the wicket Hollies Stand which, at the start, housed myself and two others.

In the second over, Lammonby drove Mohammed Siraj, Warwickshire’s end of season fast-bowling Indian Test signing, straight back to the Pavilion boundary for four, the innate smoothness of the stroke reflecting the early tranquillity of the morning. Siraj and Hannon-Dalby, pacey and accurate, now held the Somerset openers to little more than one run an over as the morning moved into a slow, unruffled awakening. At least, it looked unruffled from the vast emptiness of the Hollies Stand. On that brown, innocuous-looking pitch more was happening. “Siraj is swinging it and Hannon-Dalby is cutting it,” said the incoming text from the online watcher. That explained the focused intensity displayed by Lammonby and Iman-ul-Haq, and the expectant line of four slips placed by Warwickshire. Only a straight-driven three by Iman off Hannon-Dalby broke the slow accumulation of singles which took Somerset to 12 for 0 at the end of the ninth over.

By the end of the tenth, the floodlights were on and Iman, perhaps trying to break the shackles, essayed a sharp cut at Siraj. He was caught by Mark Burgess moving to his left behind the stumps. Somerset were 12 for 1, Iman was gone for 5 made in 40 minutes and the morning had woken up. Lammonby responded for Somerset by pulling Siraj through wide midwicket to the Family Stand boundary on the far side of the ground from the Hollies Stand. Two balls later, like a flurry of leaves being blown horizontally from a tree by an autumnal gust, the umpires and players left the field while spectators from the uncovered City End fled for the cover of the Hollies Stand’s high winged roof.  

“It’s raining,” one of them said, a fact not immediately distinguishable from bad light if you were already under the roof. Soon though there was no doubt. As the great hover-cover was floated into place and its supplementary covers rolled out, the volume of rain falling became apparent as the roof sounded as if all the tin tacks in heaven were being emptied onto it. Half an hour later the rain was still falling, and the announcement of an early lunch came as no surprise. With Somerset on 17 for 1, a further announcement that Northamptonshire had reached 58 for 0 against Surrey tended to confirm the view that avoidance of the second relegation spot would be contested between the two teams that had started here, and Kent who were not playing in this round of matches.

When play finally resumed at 2.15, 28 overs had been lost from the day and Warwickshire’s opening bowlers were completely rested. Two balls after the restart, 17 for 1 became 17 for 2 as Tom Abell came forward in defence to Hannon-Dalby and was bowled. A look at a replay showed the ball cutting in sharply. It was a devil of a ball. It was a reminder too of the risks inherent in batting first, especially at this autumnal end of the modern elongated season. My instinct though remains that that risk is outweighed by the risks of bowling first, for so often sides winning the toss and fielding seem to find themselves facing a larger opposition total than they had anticipated. Who would be a captain at the toss?

Tom Abell’s departure brought George Bartlett to the wicket. Bartlett has had a tough two years and some Somerset supporters will tell you he has had sufficient opportunity. When he gets it right though, he plays with an engaging freedom and style and scores quickly. He has too scored five centuries for Somerset and tends to score his runs when Somerset need them most. Here, he was immediately on the offensive, glancing his first ball to fine leg for a single, and in Hannon-Dalby’s next over calmly guiding a ball between gully and backward point to the gap between the Hollies Stand and the Pavilion where spectators gather to talk. Had there been spectators there to talk they would have talked of that stroke, for it was quality personified. Lammonby, quietly establishing himself, drove Hannon-Dalby through the covers for three as the wet outfield applied the brakes and straight to the Wyatt Stand for four. Bartlett, quality again, leaned beautifully into an on drive off Siraj which raced along the ground back to Hollies Stand/Pavilion gap.

That stroke took Somerset to 36 for 2. A stand of substance developing, the hopeful thought. Warwickshire turned to Jayant Yadav’s off spin. Lammonby, who does not always invoke confidence against spin, advanced down the pitch to his second ball. The bat was pushed forward, missed the ball and Burgess had the bails off with Lammonby hopelessly out of his ground. Before the numbness of spirit resulting from that dismissal had had a chance to subside, Bartlett attempted to pull a ball from Siraj, now in the 11^th over of his rain-interrupted opening spell. The ball veered wide down the leg side, Bartlett followed it, connected with the top edge, and the ball looped just beyond the empty leg slip position. Michael Burgess, from behind the stumps, took off after the ball, his body looping through the air as he went, took the catch, landed on one hand, and almost completed a cartwheel in retaining the ball. Against the run of Bartlet’s developing innings, it was an ugly stroke, a brilliant catch, and Somerset were 46 for 4.

James Rew, who has made an immense impact in his four previous County Championship matches for Somerset, attempted to turn his first ball from Siraj to leg. The ball, angled across him, straightened sharply off the pitch, struck the pads and the appeal left no doubt as to the outcome. 46 for 5. It all left a numbing despond in the hearts and stomachs of Somerset supporters as they faced the prospect of defeat, and with it the thought of relegation to the second division for the first time in a decade and a half. A glance at the sky revealed a cloud base a little higher than earlier, but a degree of humidity beginning to make itself felt did nothing to challenge the pessimism.

At the wicket now were the two Lewis’s, Goldsworthy and Gregory. The first has recently enjoyed a series of, perhaps career-establishing, fighting innings for Somerset and now brought the hope that he might stem the cascade of wickets. The second is capable both of stunningly attacking match-turning innings and, less remembered but equally valuable, obdurately defensive match-saving ones. But all too often it seems to many, he can fall early in an innings to a less then judicious stroke. At his best he bats as if he has an average of 40. In fact, his average is 24. Watching the start of a Gregory innings in circumstances such as those he faced on this morning involves an uncomfortable combination of hope that an exceptional innings is about to start, and dread that a bat hung outside off stump will edge a ball to the keeper.

Against the spin of Yadav, the pair made progress, Goldsworthy nicely cutting one ball fine of backward point to the gap between the Hollies Stand and the Pavilion for four. Against Siraj they struggled. In one over, Gregory twice edged short of slip, once for four, was beaten and, finally, struck on the pad to a loud appeal. “Gregory didn’t know much about that over,” said the text, “Siraj is swinging and seaming it,” and balls beating the bat, at either end, were not an uncommon occurrence. When Henry Brookes replaced Siraj he drifted to leg, Goldsworthy followed the ball and edged it to Burgess behind the stumps. He departed for nine and Somerset were 66 for 6. Gregory, as he is inclined to do, briefly counter attacked against Yadav. In successive balls he went up onto the back foot to drive through the covers to the Hollies Stand for four and then lofted an on drive over midwicket to clear the Raglan Stand boundary. Aldridge was unable to halt Somerset’s slide. He attempted to play Brookes through midwicket, was struck on the pad and departed leg before wicket for six. Somerset were 82 for 7 and the innings was in complete disarray.

Somerset supporters I spoke to during the rest of the day described that moment as the lowest ebb of a desperately disappointing Championship season in which Somerset had lost five of their first eight matches. I thought of 2002 when Somerset, having finished second in the Championship for the first time in their history the year before, slid inexorably through the season to relegation. In 2022, they had played with more conviction in the recent matches against Lancashire, Yorkshire and Essex, but now, against one of their chief relegation rivals, when it mattered most, their first innings had been damaged beyond apparent repair. My spirits were not improved by the text which read, “Yadav is getting big turn. This will not be easy to bat on,” for Warwickshire had two front line spinners to Somerset’s one, and 88 for 7 is no base from which to plan a spin attack.

With tea approaching, Warwickshire turned to that second spinner, Danny Briggs. It felt like a moment of truth. He came on from the Pavilion End, opposite Yadav. With the end of the Somerset first innings now in clear view, Gregory calmly defended two of the first three balls, softly driving the third to mid-on. Then, as if a button had been pressed, he launched the fourth high and long over mid-on and onto the Pavilion terrace, a hopelessly defiant gesture it seemed. But the next ball was launched higher still and squarer. It landed on, and flipped, a seat some way to my left in the 21^st row of the Hollies Stand, easy to count because the seat was virtually parallel to mine. For good measure Gregory lofted Brigg’s last ball back onto the Pavilion Terrace. A clip to the Raglan Stand at deep midwicket off Yadav by Davey took Somerset to tea on 117 for 7. Still a score of woe, but those three sixes from Gregory had looked so controlled and targeted on removing the threat of Briggs that my teatime perambulation, circumnavigations of Edgbaston are not possible without leaving the ground, was undertaken with the beginnings of a spring in my step. As I walked behind the Barnes Stand at the City End, another Somerset supporter said to me, “The pitch doesn’t look easy. If we could get to 180, perhaps 220, we might just have a chance.” “Indeed,” I replied. “A chance, but 220, even 180, is a long way off.”

The partnership had a different feel to it after tea. The batting was more controlled, less frenetic and the bowling seemed less threatening. References to the bat being beaten were no longer sprinkled through my notes and the total gradually began to mount. When Gregory dropped to one knee to sweep Yadav behind square to the Family Stand, the score reached 140 for 7 and 180 began to feel like a realistic, if still barely adequate, prospect. Gregory had been aided by Josh Davey, playing a typically measured innings. Most of his runs were turned or deflected behind square, including a confident clip off his legs to the Hollies Stand boundary off Siraj who had again returned to bowl. But, on 21, he was struck on the pad by Siraj and had to depart in the face of the umpire’s finger. A score of 140 for 8 felt, to a faster beating Somerset heart, a lot better than 88 for 7, but to the pit of the stomach it still felt painfully short of where it really needed to be.

And then, a partnership that, with Gregory’s three sixes, changed the feel of the day, if not of the match. Sajid Khan, in his second match for Somerset, with a combination of skill and inventiveness combined with some sterling defence and strike rotation from Gregory took Somerset past that dreamed of 180. A drive and a miss from Khan off Hannon-Dalby, bowling from the City End, was followed by four runs driven with an angled bat through the on side to the vertiginous West Stand. In two overs, Khan subjected Siraj to a flick to the fine leg boundary, an uppercut which flew over fourth slip to the Wyatt Stand, another flick towards fine leg which resulted in two runs driven by an insistent, Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!” from Khan and another four from a cannon-powered pull in front of midwicket reminiscent of Nick Compton in his Somerset heyday.

As the clouds and the light closed in and began to overwhelm the lights, a late cut of perfection from Khan was matched by a glance with just enough deflection to defeat the keeper. Both were off Hannon-Dalby, and both ran to the Pavilion boundary. It was a spirit-raising late charge complemented by a flat-batted four to the Barnes Stand, again off Hannon-Dalby, from Gregory. When the weather finally demanded an end to the day a further 12 overs were lost, 40 in total in the day, but Somerset closed on 182 for 8. It was not where they would have wanted to be when they won the toss and batted, and an attempt at a detached view deemed it a barely adequate score, especially if Khan’s assault was an indicator that the pitch was losing some of its venom. However, Gregory’s three sixes and Khan’s assault had given Somerset impetus and, with Gregory on 60 and Khan on 31 from 33 balls, a hint of a chance that had not seemed possible at 88 for 7.

Close. Somerset 182 for 8.