HOVE (third day of four): Sussex (22pts) beat Durham (1pt) by an innings and 133 runs
SUSSEX are back on top of the Liverpool Victoria County Championship this morning, happy to have called time on a month of frustration and failure to finish off four matches that also could, and perhaps should, have been won.
Crucially, too, their match-winning leg spinner is also seemingly healed in body and mind after a week off to rest neck and groin problems, although once again yesterday, it was the pace and swing of Jason Lewry and Yasir Arafat that did as much damage to outclassed opponents as Mushtaq Ahmed’s bottomless bag of tricks.
“I wouldn’t say that we have been off track exactly in the past four games,” Mark Robinson, the Sussex director of cricket, said, “but it has not helped that, during that spell, Mushtaq was only about 60 per cent fit. He missed the first of those previous four matches, too, against Kent — when they held on for a draw with eight wickets down.
Advertisement
“Then, when Middlesex and Lancashire both held out with nine wickets down, Mushtaq ended up bowling virtually on one leg. I’m sure we would have won those if he had been 100 per cent and not in such pain. If you add on our collapse to a 14-run defeat at Warwickshire, then, yes, we could have had a much better month of it from mid-July.
“We are a very good team, with Lewry and Arafat both bowling exceptionally well at the moment to help to take the weight off Mushtaq’s shoulders. But it doesn’t half help you when you get your international-class leg spinner back bowling with a smile on his face again.”
Sussex have the added advantage now of both a light week in the run-up to their C&G Trophy final appearance against Lancashire next Saturday and the knowledge that their next championship fixture starting on August 31 — against one of their close rivals, Hampshire — takes place at Hove.
Expect the same type of slow but solid surface, taking just enough spin, as the one that proved to be such a killing ground for every Durham batsman bar the splendidly defiant Phil Mustard. If Shane Warne is back from Australia’s training camp to lead Hampshire, the head-to-head with a rejuvenated Mushtaq should attract supporters from farther afield than the South Coast.
Durham began a blustery but, mercifully, rain-free and often sunny day on 42 for two in their second innings, and it did not take very long for Arafat and Mushtaq — now switching to the Sea End — to reduce them to 79 for five.
Advertisement
Jimmy Maher flashed a catch to first slip, Dale Benkenstein was utterly deceived by a googly for the second time in two days, and two balls later Gareth Breese was bowled pushing hesitantly half-forward. Mustard, however, as in the first innings, counter-attacked with skill and verve while Ben Harmison dug in at the other end and also produced the odd stroke of real quality.
When Lewry bowled Harmison with a searing yorker, however, and then completed Callum Thorp’s pair two balls later, all that remained between Sussex and a victory completed 30 minutes after lunch was Mustard’s eyecatching strokeplay. He completed his second first-class century with an off-driven twelfth four and was last out next ball.