County Championship 2025. Division 1. Hampshire v Somerset 18th, 19th, 20th and 21st April. Southampton.

Hampshire. M.G. Stoneman, F.S. Middleton, N.R.T. Gubbins, T.J. Prest, T.E. Albert, B.C. Brown (c) (w), L.A, Dawson, B.R. Hampton, J.K. Fuller, K.J. Abbott, B.T.J. Wheal.

Somerset. A.M. Vaughan, S.R. Dickson, T.A. Lammonby, T.B. Abell, T. Banton, J.E.K. Rew (c) (w), K.L. Aldridge, C. Overton, M. Pretorius, M.J. Leach, A.R.J. Ogborne.

Toss. Hampshire. Elected to field

First day – A chill wind blew

It was a morning of two halves, a morning because that is all the play there was, steady rain after lunch saw to that. Somerset lost the toss on a day made for bowling and found themselves batting. After an hour, they were 57 for 1 and Archie Vaughan and Tom Lammonby looked like they were getting the measure of the pitch and the bowling, and like they were beginning to take control of proceedings. An hour later, after three wickets in 11 balls the players were walking off for lunch with Somerset six down, still six runs short of their hundred. They were in disarray, and their disarray was fixed on the scoreboard as if in aspic to bore into the minds of their supporters as the afternoon rain wiped out prospects of any further play. At the start, the cloud had been high and white, but it was soon formed of a smooth blanket with a forecast predicting an afternoon of the sort of steady rain which goes with that sort of cloud. On this occasion, the forecast did not err, and Somerset, in their distress, had to bear it, or thank it.

I had made my way to the ground through what I thought was a green area at the edge of one of the car parks. Looking out for moving cars, I saw a man in a red baseball cap waving me through from about fifty yards away. Curious I thought, for I could see no moving cars in any direction. Then I saw the risk he was waving me past. A golfer was lining up his swing, if that is what golfers do. I have never held anything beyond a putter at the seaside in my life. The man in the red cap was there for the sole purpose of holding up play and warning users of the footpath which crossed the golf course when a stroke was about to be played. I have never, yet, been called to account by an umpire or a steward for holding up a game of cricket by walking behind the arm. I have now held up a game of golf. Perhaps Somerset, when they play Hampshire, should have a man in a red hat to warn about oncoming Hampshire pace bowlers, for they seem to regularly fall victim to them, in recent times at least. Four of the last five Championship matches between the two sides had been lost, the fifth was drawn and by lunch, the sixth was teetering on the edge.

Sitting in the Shane Warne Stand with the Pavilion to my right and the Northern End and the hotel which dominates it to my left, I was subjected to an increasingly chill wind blowing hard from behind the Pavilion. It wasn’t as cold as the arctic blast that had engulfed Kidderminster in the fourth game of the 2024 Championship, but it resurrected memories of watching that match in a cold so persistent it vies with the cricket for a place in the memory. Now, for Somerset supporters, the first day of Southampton 2025 was a chill morning in every sense of the word.

Compared with Taunton, the Southampton ground is built on a different scale. The playing area seems huge by comparison, and for this match the pitch was set towards the Nursery Ground and seemed a million miles from the Shane Warne Stand. Distant though the action was, Kyle Abbott running in from the Northern End to bowl the first ball of the match was real enough. He had been Hampshire’s pace destroyer in chief against Somerset since before the pandemic. Will any Somerset supporter who was there ever forget his 17 wickets in the match in 2019? Distant from the play the Shane Warne Stand may have been, but from my seat, at long leg to the right-hander when the bowling was from the Northern End, it was clear it had lost none of its discipline. After a few early forays with short balls, the bowlers kept the ball up, induced some early playing and missing and beat the bat more than once. It was, as they say, a good toss to win, and Hampshire seemed intent on making the most of it.

Sean Dickson was an early victim. He began with intent. A single from his first ball, in the fourth over, was pursued with a “Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!” His only boundary flew through backward point from a flashing angled bat. But then he was late down on a ball from Brad Wheal, bowling from the Pavilion End, which a replay suggests cut in just enough to beat the inside edge and strike the pad on its way to the stumps. Somerset 14 for 1. Dickson 7. Dickson had struggled when allocated the early season opening spot since he arrived at Somerset in 2023. Thus far in 2025, he had struggled again. By the time he was out, in his first four innings of 2025, he had totalled 26.

Tom Lammonby, more successful in 2024 at three than he had been in the two previous seasons as an opener, joined Archie Vaughan. Vaughan had made a distinctly positive impression opening at the end of 2024, causing many to wonder if he might be the answer to Somerset’s persistent opening problems. He had been less successful in April than in September and had shown himself vulnerable to the hook against Sussex at Hove. But here, he and Lammonby began by batting with as much discipline as Hampshire were showing with their bowling. Batting was far from easy, and despite the care shown by the batters the bat was still beaten, and the edge initially produced more runs than the middle. One edge, from Vaughan off Abbott, flew towards the slips but fell well short. Another, off Wheal, also fell short but crossed the boundary. That took Somerset to 23 for 1 and the first ten overs had been an itchy watch for Somerset supporters.

But now, Vaughan and Lammonby began to settle. Brett Hampton replaced Abbott at the Northern End and his first over cost 13 runs. Lammonby pounced on his first two balls as they drifted to leg and glanced them both for four to the Colin Ingleby-Mackenzie Stand. Then Vaughan pulled him firmly through midwicket for four more. It was still early, but the strokes brought hope. With the play beginning to flow Somerset’s way, Lammonby, scoring at nearly a run a ball and looking the more secure of the two batters, drove Wheal straight back to the Pavilion boundary. Somerset 44 for 1. Now Vaughan began to push. A drive, straight of mid-on, reached the Ingleby-Mackenzie boundary and the slow, smooth movement of a horizontal bat resulted in a cut off James Fuller, replacing Wheal at the Pavilion End, which ran through the covers for four more. The Somerset mind was beginning to relax, a mood encouraged further by the purest of extra cover drives from Lammonby for two and another, coaxed beautifully off the bat through the same spot. Adding to the shift in mood was a steady string of adroitly placed singles from both batters as, left-handed and right-handed, they began to play with mirror images of style, ease and confidence.

Somerset were 69 for 1 scored at, according to the scoreboard, 3.6 runs an over. It was a far cry from the early struggles against Abbott and Wheal and hope began to grow of a healthy total. Then, when I looked up, the floodlights were on, although my eye had not noticed any deterioration in the light or the switching on of the lights. Eyes back on the cricket. As I focused, Vaughan followed an away swinger from Fuller initially directed at off stump and was caught behind. Somerset 69 for 2. Vaughan 29 from 65 balls played with care and attention. But then, the care and attention wandered. Lammonby drove at a ball pitched full, wide of off stump and angled away from him by Fuller. Brown took the offered catch in front of first slip. If you were a Somerset supporter, it was a heart-wrenching end to an innings of developing class which had promised so much more. Hampshire supporters cheered. Somerset ones, I suspect, pursed their lips.

Tom Banton arrived to join Tom Abell and after turning his first ball neatly to long leg for four, played and missed twice before clipping Abbott ferociously through midwicket. A one-bounce four. At least that was the initial vision. But before the vision could be realised, the eye caught Nick Gubbins flying through the air at 45 degrees and the ear heard a player shouting, “Catch it!” as they often do when a ball goes in the air. Usually such shouts are forlorn, even farcical, and this one might so easily have ended with the ball being retrieved from beyond the boundary. Not this time. Gubbins had the ball in his hands. It may turn out to be Hampshire’s catch of the season. It left Somerset on 93 for 4. Banton, a doubtless headshaking 5.

Lunch was fast approaching, and Somerset and its supporters needed its refuge. Not yet. James Rew, appointed youngest ever captain in Lewis Gregory’s absence through injury, was caught behind trying to keep Abbott out and, from the fifth ball of the final over before lunch, Kasey Aldridge was bowled trying to keep Wheal out. Each had lasted four balls. Somerset were 94 for 6 and the players left the field for lunch with Wheal still having one ball to complete his over.

Tom Abell had come to the wicket at the fall of Vaughan. It seemed an aeon before, but was precisely 8.4 overs. In those 8.4 overs, 69 for 1 had become 94 for 6, 93 for 3 had become 94 for 6 in 11 balls, and Somerset, carefully laying the foundations of their innings at 69 for 1, now found the innings, barring a miracle, in ruins. Abell had ten in 40 minutes of surviving the whirlwind which had blown through the batters at the other end. If there was to be any meaningful recovery, much would rest on his shoulders, although as I left the Shane Warne Stand with the wind blowing ever more chill and those final 8.4 overs whirring around in my head, that seemed beyond even him.

Close. Somerset 94 for 6.