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3 days ago
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- Yahoo
Alfie Ogborne takes five wickets as Somerset defeat Durham at home
Metro Bank One Day Cup: Somerset 258-6 defeated Durham 255-9 by four wickets Alfie Ogborne returned career-best figures as Somerset carved out a four-wicket victory over Durham at Taunton to extend their winning start to the Metro Bank One-Day Cup campaign, writes Andrew Stockhausen, ECB Reporters' Network. Playing in front of a near-sell-out crowd at the Cooper Associates Ground, the 22-year-old left arm seamer claimed 5-41 as Durham were restricted to 255-9 after winning the toss. Will Rhodes kept the visitors afloat, staging an assured knock of 100 from 120 balls with 10 fours and sharing in stands of 78 with Haydon Mustard and 58 with Paul Coughlin for the fifth and seventh wickets respectively. Mustard contributed 38 and Coughlin, the only Durham batter to score at better than a run-a-ball, raised 38 from 30 balls and accrued 2 fours and a six. Read more: Rew brothers combine to guide Somerset to win in Metro Bank opener Somerset wrap up victory over Durham inside two days Ben Green helps Somerset to victory over rival Gloucestershire Teenage prospect Thomas Rew then anchored Somerset's run chase, top-scoring with 84 not out from 81 deliveries and striking 8 fours and 2 sixes as the home side reached their target with 22 balls to spare. He shared in a crucial partnership of 95 for the fourth wicket with his brother, James, who posted 39, while opener Archie Vaughan weighed in with 37 and Ben Green scored 34 not out at the death. The pick of the Durham bowlers, Rhodes capped a fine all-round performance by taking 3-42 in a losing cause. Durham's decision to bat first backfired when they slumped to 67-4 inside 15 overs. Jake Ball had Emilio Gay caught at the wicket for seven, while the impressive Ogborne persuaded Scott Borthwick to top-edge a pull shot to mid-wicket and then produced a startling yorker to remove Colin Ackermann without scoring. When Ben Green located Ollie Robinson's outside edge and James Rew again demonstrated sound glovework, Somerset were on top. Charged with the task of rebuilding the innings, Rhodes and Mustard played responsibly, adding 50 in 83 balls to redress the balance. Rhodes went to a half century via 63 deliveries and Mustard hit spinner Lewis Goldsworthy over the mid-wicket boundary rope as the Durham innings realised three figures in the 26th over. Somerset needed a wicket and skipper James Rew recalled Ogborne at the Marcus Trescothick Pavilion end, the left armer inducing the hitherto rock-solid Mustard to send a top-edged pull looping to Green at point with the score 145-5 in the 34th. When Kasey Aldridge came on at the same end and had George Drissell caught at backward point, the visitors were 170-6 and in danger of under-achieving. That was the cue for Coughlin to emerge breathing fire, the all-rounder seizing the initiative and relegating Rhodes to a supporting role in a progressive seventh-wicket alliance which added 58 in 7.2 overs. Rhodes still saw enough of the strike to post his second List-A hundred from 118 balls, clipping Ogborne into the leg side to attain that milestone in the 46th. He was out later in the same over, hoisting Ogborne high to Tom Lammonby on the square leg boundary. Ogborne then completed his first senior five-wicket haul, inducing Coughlin to hit straight to long-on with the score 237-8 in the 48th. Somerset's chase was afforded a super-charged start, Vaughan and Lammonby assuming T20 mode in harvesting nine boundaries between them in an opening stand of 51 in 8.1 overs as Durham's seamers struggled with their lengths. But the home side did not have things entirely their own way, Mitchell Killeen affording the visitors much-needed relief by bowling Lammonby for 24. Vaughan was then dismissed for 37 in near-identical fashion by Rhodes with the score 78-2 in the 16th. That soon became 78-3, Goldsworthy shuffling in front of a straight one from Drissell as Durham roared right back into contention. Just as they did when defeating Middlesex at Radlett a few days earlier, Somerset looked to the Rew brothers to steady the ship. Both oozed calm confidence, going about their business in workmanlike fashion to keep the reply on track, James initially proving the more aggressive and Thomas dropping into a supporting role. Elder sibling James timed the ball from the outset, playing a superb back-foot force for four off the bowling of Rhodes as Somerset advanced to 124-3 at halfway, requiring a further 133 at 5.2 an over. The 50 partnership arrived via 59 balls, 17-year-old Thomas raising that landmark with a wristy cut for four at the expense of Luke Robinson. Warming to his task, the teenager fine cut Killeen for four through third man and then whipped him over mid-wicket for six before pulling and cutting Robinson for successive boundaries to overtake his brother. The partnership was worth 95 when Rhodes fooled James Rew into miss-timing a drive and holing out to mid-on for 39. Undeterred by events at the other end, Rew junior went to his second successive 50 from 45 deliveries. But Rhodes accounted for Josh Thomas, held at long-on, and Fin Hill was run out for a duck with the score 189-6 as Durham threatened to upset the Somerset applecart. Calm in the face of pressure, the experienced Green offered Rew staunch support thereafter, contributing 34 not out to an unbroken stand of 69 for the seventh wicket.
The Guardian
16-06-2025
- Sport
- The Guardian
County cricket: Northants and Somerset sitting pretty in T20 Blast
After six consecutive wins, Northamptonshire must have been confident of a lucky seventh at Wantage Road when reducing Durham to 77 for five, Ben Raine gone for an eight-ball 17, the fightback stalled almost before it started. But Will Rhodes and Jimmy Neesham have played plenty of T20 cricket (in Neesham's case plenty for Northants) and they set their sights on building a competitive target and, in posting 157 for eight, the visitors were in the game. By the end of the powerplay, with the leaders needing only 102 off 14 overs with nine wickets in hand, it looked like Northants could chalk up another victory. Cue the canny spin of Nathan Sowter and Callum Parkinson, who conceded just one boundary each as their six overs yielded three wickets for just 28 runs, as Durham celebrated a win by 15 runs. It was another example of two truisms of cricket in any format. Firstly, the match is always longer than you might think, and that time gives opportunities for the pendulum to swing, but you have to be in the game to make the game. Secondly, and the transfixing Test match at Lord's bore out this point, boundaries and dizzying run rates can bring the spectacle, but a tight, low-scoring thriller, where every decision is a chance to wrest back the advantage, provides richer fare. Northamptonshire are still sitting pretty at the top of the North Group in the T20 Blast with 24 points, with Durham in a clutch of three teams immediately behind them with 16. That said, high-scoring games can be fun too, with the Birmingham Bears and Nottinghamshire producing a rare close finish – there really should be more of them – at Edgbaston. After a somewhat pedestrian powerplay that yielded just 37 runs and one wicket, teenage spinner Farhan Ahmed the successful bowler having been trusted with bowling two of the six, a pair of international bears, Tom Latham and Dan Mousley got going. Their 116 in 11.3 overs for the second wicket set a platform for Ed Barnard and Moeen Ali to blaze 57 off 20 balls at the death to get Birmingham over 200. Danny Briggs, another slow bowler with a job to do in the powerplay, kept a lid on things, but, in another echo of old-school limited-overs cricket, Nottinghamshire had kept wickets in hand. Opener Lyndon James found a partner in wicketkeeper Tom Moores, and the pair put on 107 in 9.2 overs. There were still runs to get after James was out for 50, but Daniel Sams is as good as they come at six-hitting at the death, though it was Moores who delivered the walk-off home run off the last ball to seal the victory. There's not much to separate them on the field or table, the Outlaws and Bears fifth and sixth on 12 points. Sussex, one of the teams of the season so far, are just two points off first place in the South Group. Their victory in Cardiff was a textbook example of constructing a winning position and then driving it home. Harrison Ward blitzed the powerplay making 55 off 24 balls before handing over to the rest of the top six, who all made scores. Glamorgan then lost wickets at bad times, never landing a punch to be all out in the 19th over, 28 runs short. Australian seamer Nathan McAndrew was the chief destroyer with six for 21; he must enjoy these batters, having taken five for 19 against them last week at Hove. He's never played international cricket, but McAndrew has almost 100 Big Bash and Blast matches under his belt. He knows what he's doing. In a good week for South African cricketers, teenager Lhuan-dre Pretorius announced his arrival in England with a scorching 44 off 22 balls as Hampshire posted 63 for one off a rain-interrupted six overs. After Messrs Duckworth, Lewis and Stern had been consulted, Middlesex were obliged to chase 76 for the win. Chris Wood started with a maiden, but Max Holden was only getting his eye in as he went four, four, six, four, four, two, six off the next seven balls he faced. Needing 13 off the sixth over for the win, Kane Williamson and Ben Geddes got 12, Scott Currie limiting them to just the one boundary. So 12 more runs scored by Middlesex, but the points shared – it makes sense in the head if not in the heart. Young Pretorius might not know about his country's exit from the 1992 World Cup. And it's probably best not to tell him. Somerset did a Northants in the South Group, giving up a 100% record with a defeat to Kent but retaining first place in the table. The match was won (but only just, Somerset fell only five runs short) in an opening stand of 158 in 13.2 overs between Tawanda Muyeye (70) and Daniel Bell-Drummond (100). Bell-Drummond's effort was the first ton in the Blast this season, coming as most teams get close to the halfway mark in the 14-game schedule, which goes to show that such landmarks are rare. The Kent veteran, who is somehow still only 31, has not enjoyed a season marked by his usual consistency, his only score of note 223 at Lord's but even that was in a losing cause. The opener was one of this column's five county cricketers of the year in 2023 and one can only hope that his high summer and autumn can help rescue a poor April and May for his team. County cricket needs a strong Kent; those of us who recall those great sides of the 1970s do for sure. In an age when the orthodoxy suggests it's demanding to expect players to switch formats, Matthew Potts keeps running in. This season, he's played four Championship matches, two ODIs, one T20I and two Blast T20s. And he never gives less than his all. As he proved in his latest outing, snaring five for 17 against Yorkshire, ripping the heart out of the White Rose batting as the home side collapsed from 55 for three to 100 for nine. That the runs were largely knocked off by ex-Tykes, Alex Lees and Will Rhodes, will not have pleased the locals. Potts, his very name suggesting solid reliability, will continue to do a job for Durham and England as required. He's not the most glamorous of players, but fans love a lad whose head never drops, who never sulks when left out and who treats every match like we would had we the talent to play the game at that level. This article is from The 99.94 Cricket Blog
