County Championship Notts v Glamorgan at Trent Bridge April 14-17

Neil Whitaker reports

Day 1

GLAMORGAN roared back into the match to vindicate their skipper David Lloyd’s decision to field first after winning the toss with five wickets for 44 runs to wrap the Nottinghamshire first innings up for 302.

At tea Nottinghamshire looked set for a big score with Ben Duckett unbeaten on 101 and skipper Steven Mullaney not out on 28.  On 29 Mullaney edged a drive off James Weighell but Lloyd failed to hold on to the with his left hand as he fell to the ground.  Two balls later Mullaney pulled Weighell over the square leg boundary for a six. At this point the Glamorgan players looked dead on their feet but Mullaney’s and Ducket’s partnership was broken in quite a tame way.   Mullaney drove Michael Hogan to Sam Northeast at short cover who took a low catch.  His 44 came from 75 balls and included five fours and a six.  

Mullaney’ s dismissal started a collapse with the new ball only seven overs away. Tom Moores came in and five minutes later he was back in the hutch when he guided Marcus Labuschange, bowling seamers, to stumper Chris  Cooke who took a tumbling catch.  In the next over Liam Patterson-White played across the line to Hogan and after a delay was given out for a duck.

Put into bat the Nottinghamshire openers  made a brisk start and after 20 balls they had made 21 after adding another five runs Neser got one to cramp Ben Slater for room and he edged Michael Neser to Northeast at second slip.

Haseeb Hameed elegantly drove Timm Van Der Gugten to the extra cover boundary g]for the shot of the morning.  Just as he looked good for at least a fifty his innings was brought unexpectedly to a close when Duckett drove Weighell straight but the sprawling bowler managed to deflect the ball on to the stumps at the bowlers end with his outstretched right foot. Haseem Hameed was inches out of his ground and umpRichard Illingworth immediately gave Haseeb Hameed out.

Nottinghamshire head coach Peter Moores said: “Realistically Haseeb can count himself to be really unlucky.  Duckett played a good shot, got a deflection and you get one of those every two years.  But you’ve got to take it on the chin.”

Glamorgan assistant coach David Harrison said:“Winning the toss and bowling, we erred bowling a bit too full but the way Michael Hogan and Timm van Gugten came out and applied the pressure, and the way we finished picking up six wickets in the last session puts the day in the balance.

Labuschagne has pushed his bowling. We’ve seen him bowl seam in Australia, he’s let us know about it and he bowled really well, took two important wickets. Neser in his first bowl back for a number of weeks feels pretty good, hopefully he’ll only improve now for the rest of the season.

Fair play to Salter and Lloyd, to get through the last five tricky overs was a great effort. The target will be to get a first innings lead, Duckett and Mullaney showed that if you do get in, the runs will come.”

Glamorgan won the toss on a greenish wicket and put Nottinghamshire in. The visitors fielded Labuschagne and Neser for their first LV county championship matches of the season.  Nottinghamshire made two changes from the side that beat Sussex last week Dane Paterson came in for Luke Fletcher and James Pattinson replaced Lyndon James.

Duckett was joined by Joe Clarke and they added 67off 155 balls before Clarke gloved one from Van Der Gutton on to his off bail.Clarke’s best shot during his innings was when he gently pushed Van Der Gugten to the cover boundary.  He then pulled Lloyd to the square leg boundary for the first six of the match. In his next over Van Der Gutton got his second wicket of the innings when Joey Evison pushed forward at him and was adjudged leg before for a five ball duck.

Glamorgan should have broken the partnership in the penultimate over before lunch Duckett edged Lloyd to Northeast at second slip but this time Northeast couldn’t hold on to. If Northeast had held on to it Nottinghamshire would not have reached 200

After two wild slashes at Weighell when Duckett completely missed the ball he caressed the third ball to the cover boundary. Duckett flayed at Weighell and somehow managed to get an under edge to it and the ball flew through the slips to the boundary and brought up his fifty from 104 balls.

The fifty partnership with Mullaney off  67 balls when he reversed swept Salter to the mid wicket boundary.  By now Duckett was making batting look easy he casually cut Weighell to the third man boundary.  He brought up his century when he  swept Lloyd for a single. His hundred came off 169 balls in 242 minutes with ten fours.

Like Mullaney’ dismissal, Duckett's took everybody by surprise when he gave a simple return catch to Labuschange.

Moores added: “I thought that Duckett batted beautifully he did what I want all the top order to do. He’s worked hard at his game and he takes every opportunity to take the game to the bowlers and put pressure on them.  He’s frustrated that he got out when he did but he put us in a good position.”

Glamorgan got their final bowling point, and you would have got long odds at 3.00 on Glamorgan getting three points today, when Nesser sent Brett Hutton’s off stump flying out of the ground.

Nottinghamshire’s last wicket pair of Paterson and Pattinson somehow got Nottinghamshire past 300.  Neser wrapped the Nottinghamshire innings up when Pattinson got too far under it and skied and Neser ran from the bowling crease to short cover to take the catch.

With five overs left in the day Nottinghamshire thought they had an early breakthrough when Lloyd edged a drive and was caught at second slip but Pattinson had over stepped.

Moores said: “We dominated the first two sessions. We were in a good position and we were moving along nicely but they came back at us and played some good cricket and full credit to them.  We’ve got 300 and at Trent Bridge that is a competitive score.  There is a bit in the pitch so we’ve got a good chance with the ball.”

Day 2

A NINTH wicket partnership of 106 between James Weighell and Timm  Van Der Gugten took Glamorgan into a first innings lead of 52 on the second day at Trent Bridge.

When they came together Glamorgan were 54 behind Nottinghamshire first innings score and  300 looked a long way off but Weighell and Van Der Gugten batting with good fortune and some skill got Glamorgan past 300.  Weighell pulled Dane Paterson to the mid wicket boundary to take Glamorgan into the lead.

Van Der Gugten clipped Liam Patterson-White off his legs for a couple to bring up his fifty, two balls later he got a single to bring up the hundred partnership with Weighell.  At 248 for eight Glamorgan had just lost Sam Northeast who hit 85. The partnership was broken when Weighell pushed forward at Pattterson-White and  Tom Moores took a low catch.

Nottinghamshire bowling coach Kevin Shine said: “It’s been one of our poorer days and that’s because we have set ourselves incredibly high standards.  But I look forward at the commitment of the players and I cannot fault that. We’ve got to look at where we can improve.

The Glamorgan players played really well at the end and it was a good partnership.  But we have to be calm and keep to our plans.  The guys found a way last week to win. We have got two days left and they know what they are trying to do.”

Resuming on 33 for none Glamorgan lost their first wicket of the day in the 4th over of the day when James Pattinson found the edge of Andrew Slater’s bat and  Joe Clarke took a comfortable waiste height catch at first slip.

Four balls later Nottinghamshire got the prized wicket of Marcus  Labuschagne who shouldered arms to a straight ball from Brett Hutton and was plumb leg before.

Nottinghamshire had to wait until the second ball after lunch before they were given a chance when Northeast edged a drive off Paterson and Patterson-White at point could only get his fingertips to it.

David Lloyd brought his fifty up off 70 balls in 112 minutes when he clipped Joey  Evison off his legs to fine leg for a single. When he was completely beaten by a great ball from Pattinson. The hundred partnership with Northeast was brought up by Lloyd with a straight drive off Pattinson. The Glamorgan captain knew it was headed for the boundary as soon as he hit it because he never moved.  Their hundred partnership came from 191 balls.  

Nottinghamshire broke the partnership when Hutton was brought back into the attack and he struck immediately when Lloyd edged a defensive drive to Ben  Duckett at second slip who had to move to his left.

Hutton should have got his third wicket of the innings when Kieran Carlson was dropped before he had scored in his 50th first class match for Glamorgan.  Haseeb Hameed at third slip moved to his left to take the edge but he could only parrie it. To Carlson’s relief neither Moores or the other two slips could react quickly enough.

After that drop Carlson looked at ease until he reached 22 when he nibbled at one from Evison to give Moores an easy catch.  Evison got his second wicket in his next over when Chris Cooke edged a short ball to Moores. 

Paterson got his first wicket when Callum Taylor drove hard at a straight ball and edged it to Clarke who took a low catch at first slip.  Glamorgan had lost three wickets for 16 runs in eight overs and while this was happening Northeast at the other must have been wondering what was going on.

Northeast said: “It was a good day in the end, especially that little partnership between Weighell and van der Gugten which swung things back into our favour a bit, though there’s a long way to go.

It’s been a good game so far, pretty equally-matched, with two good days ahead of us. It was tricky at times batting, it was pretty tough, but nice to get a (personal) score on the board although disappointed not to go on to three figures.

The pitch felt good for a large part of the innings as it flattened out a bit but they got it swinging and the ball started nipping again, we had a period exactly the same where we got it to swing.

There’s definitely something in the wicket for our bowlers and we can take a bit of confidence from that, but that partnership at the end has swing momentum in our favour.”

But he stuck to his task and  ran Paterson to third man for a single to bring his fifty off 103 balls in 137 minutes with fifth fours.  In the next over he gracefully drilled Pattinson to the cover boundary.  On  54 Northeast glanced Paterson off his hips and a flying Moores could only get his fingertips to it.

Michael  Neser pulled Evison for a six over mid wicket but Evison got his revenge with his next ball which came in at Neser, kept low and bowled him. Northeast’s 269 minute innings ended after 162 balls when Paterson sent his off stump cartwheeling out of the ground. 

Day 3

TIMM Van Der Guten took four Nottinghamshire wickets in the evening session and could have had another two, to leave Glamorgan on the verge of winning this LV County Championship match at Trent Bridge with Nottinghamshire 147 ahead with two wickets standing 

He said: “The game’s at an interesting point, we’ve got two more wickets to take, hopefully we can do that with minimal damage and it’ll be an interesting chase.

If you stick it  in enough, there’s enough there for the bowlers so we’ll have to bat well.  It was nice to spend some time in the middle and to bat with Hoges to eke out an extra 20-odd runs, I always enjoy my batting.

After my first three overs I felt in good rhythm and all the bowlers were outstanding today, Michael Neser 19 overs for 25 runs, hopefully we can create two more chances and the batters can knock it off.

It’s a really good cricket wicket, if you bowl well enough you’ll get rewards, if you bat well enough you’ll get rewards, so it’s been a good game so far.”

Earlier in the day he added another six runs to his overnight score as Glamorgan batted for 29 minutes on the third morning adding another 25 runs with some lust blows from Michael Hogan and Van Der Gugten. With three overs remaining to get another 21 runs for their fifth batting point Van Der Guten took a few steps down the pitch, got underneath it and found a back peddling Joe Clarke at deepish mid off.

Nottinghamshire’s Aussie paceman James Pattinson, playing his first match in his third spell with the East Midlands county,took one for 111 in 27 overs on his return to the club only the sixth time that he has conceded 100 runs in a first class innings.

Ben Duckett fell five runs short off his second century of the match and was the first of Van Der Guten’s victims.  Duckett’s 226 minute innings ended in the third over after tea when he was five short of his second century of the match. Van Der Guten got one to leave Duckett who edged it and David Lloyd at slip took a low catch to leave Nottinghamshire five wickets down 84 runs ahead.  During his innings Duckett passed 7,000 first class runs.

Van Der Guten got his second wicket of the innings when Liam  Patterson-White moved across his stumps and played around the ball and was leg before. Four overs later Tom Moores played straight at Van Der Guten but edged it and Sam Northeast took a great catch diving to his left.  Earlier on  23 Moores flashed at Van Der Guten but stumper Chris  Cooke moving to his left was unable to cling on to the chance and should have left it to Lloyd at first slip.

Pattinson became Van Der Guten’s fourth victim when Pattinson edged him and Northeast took another catch at second slip this was low at ankle height  and Pattinson stood his ground for a moment but Umpire Richard Illingworth gave him out.

Glamorgan thought they had got a third wicket before lunch when they all confidently went up for a strangle against Joe Clarke by Cooke  off Van Der Guten.  After lunch both Clarke and Duckett dug in against some accurate bowling in particular by the Aussie Neser when their fifty partnership came up it was Duckett who had scored the bulk of the runs.  

Nottinghamshire captain Steven Mullaney said: “We are still in it with two wickets left. I would take a lead of 200 so we could bowl them out with that target.  Duckett was magnificent, losing two early wickets hurt us but we hung on.  The partnership between Duckett and Clarke got us back into the match.  We lost wickets at crucial times. I played a poor shot and I hold my hands up for that.  

Full credit to Glamorgan they showed us how to bowl on that wicket and I think it will be a good thing if we learn from it.”

For the second in this match Duckett made batting look easy and he took Nottinghamshire into the lead when he turned Van Der Guten off his legs for a single to mid wicket.  Duckett reached his fifty which came from 113 balls when he drove Neser to the cover boundary. His fifty included seven fours in 138 minutes. He quickly moved from the fifties into the seventies as his fifty partnership with Mullaney came from only 85 balls and Mullaney only made eight of them. The partnership was broken when Mullaney edged a ball from James Weighell that  he should have left well alone and Cooke took his third catch of the innings.

Batting at three Duckett made an early appearance to the crease coming in the fourth over. Trailing by 77 runs, Nottinghamshire lost their first second innings wicket without a run on the board.  Michael Hogan got one to rise at  Haseeb Hameed taking the shoulder of the bat and looped to Kieran Carlson at gully.

Hogan got his second wicket in his next over when Ben Slater tried to pull a short ball but feathered it down the leg side to Cooke.
During the 63 run partnership for the third wicket with Duckett, Clarke was very much the junior partner  then suddenly out of the blue he aggressively clipped Hogan to the mid wicket boundary.  But it wasn’t long before Nottinghamshire lost their third wicket, still 14 runs behind Glamorgan.  Neser, who bowled well throughout the day, enticed Clarke to push forward at him  and feathered him to Cooke who took a low catch.
Joey Evison came out with Haseeb Hameed as his runner and as usual when a runner is at the crease confusion runs amok as both Haseeb Hameed and Pattinson survived run out attempts.
However Evison and Brett Hutton saw Nottinghamshire to the close without any further loss.

Day 4

GLAMORGAN won their first LV County Championship match at Trent Bridge since 1998, for Nottinghamshire the defeat sees an end to their five match unbeaten run at their home ground.

Seeing Glamorgan home were the world’s number one test batsman Marnus Labuschange who hit an unbeaten 50 and Kieran Carlson who was not out on 47 after the pair added 74 in 14 overs.

Glamorgan captain David Lloyd said: “We were always confident but at the same time you’re nervous because they’ve got a very strong bowling outfit and we had to work hard for the runs.  It was a great four days, the efforts the lads put in each day were incredible and those wins are hard-fought.

Labuschange and Carlson both batted really nicely, played with really good intent and that’s what we needed, it was a very good chase.  Throughout the whole squad the boys did well, although the first session didn’t go to plan after winning the toss, the bowlers showed what we’re capable of doing.

We’ve worked hard over the winter with the mental side of the game as well, we do perform well against the big teams, we need to be consistent and the main thing for us going forward is our consistency with everything we do.”

At lunchtime the situation looked tricky for Glamorgan as they were two wickets down needing 166.   The partnership between Labuschange and Sam Northeast calmed the Glamorgan nerves because when they came together they had lost both openers on the space of five overs.   First Andrew Salter pushed forward at Liam Patterson-White’s seventh ball played around it, was hit on his boot and was leg before.  He was joined back in the hutch by his skipper Lloyd who moved across his stumps, offered no shot to  Dane Paterson and was bowled on the stroke of lunch.

Salter and Lloyd made a brisk start on their quest for the runs as the Nottinghamshire bowlers: James Pattinson,  Brett Hutton and Paterson pitched the ball up hoping to get some late swing and they reached 32 by the eighth over. Salter even  fell over when he  dug out a good yorker from Pattinson but he  still got a couple of runs.  

Labuschange and Northeast added 40 for the third wicket in 12 overs.  Labuschange came down the wicket to Patterson-White and launched him into the Radcliffe Road stand for a straight six.  Two balls later Northeast guided a short ball from Patterson-White to the extra cover boundary. In the next over Northeast pulled Pattinson and Paterson came in from the boundary but he never seemed in control of taking the catch as he was facing the sun. But eventually he did take the catch falling to the ground.

Northeast got off the mark with an elegant cover boundary off Patterson-White.  In Patterson-White’s next over Northeast was quickly off his marks to drive him to the mid wicket boundary. At this stage it looked like Northeast and Labuschagne would see Glamorgan home.

Labuschagne brought up the Glamorgan hundred up when he drilled Hutton to the extra cover boundary.  With the target below 50 he hit Paterson on the up to the extra cover boundary.  Nottinghamshire should have had him the next ball when Labuschange on 35  edged Paterson but Tom Moores diving to his right, when it looked an easier chance for slip, couldn’t hold on to it.

Carlson went down the wicket to Patterson-White and drilled him straight to the long off boundary.  He brought up the fifty partnership off 66 balls with Labuschange when he edged Paterson wide of the three slips.

Labuschange reached his fifty off 93 balls in 117 minutes when he chopped Pattinson out on to the offside.  Carlson hooked the next ball for a six to win the match.

After 24 minutes on the final morning Glamorgan got a breakthrough when Hutton who had batted for 76 minutes shouldered arms  to Michael Hogan but the ball came back in and clipped the off bail.  Hogan finished the innings with three for 48.

17 minutes later the injured Joey  Evison’s 112 minute innings ended when he tried to pull James Weighell but gloved it to Chris Cook diving to his left.

Nottinghamshire’s Ben Duckett said: “It’s disappointing to lose but it is early in the season, there are not many teams who go through the whole season undefeated. We will go away and try to do better.  To be honest Glamorgan outplayed us from the beginning, in particular the way they bowled yesterday. I had to work hard for my runs but I felt good but I played a rubbish shot to get out on Saturday.  I would prefer to score a hundred if it means that we win games.

I thought that the toss was crucial if we had won the toss things could have been different.”

FULL SCORECARD

April 15, 2022 10:38 am

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