Day 2: Butcher betters Bicknell's best
By Charles Randall at Headingley
Second day of four: Surrey (17-0) trail Yorkshire (250-9 dec) by 233 runs
DAVID BYAS needed a double-headed coin to stand a fighting chance of reining in the championship leaders, but he failed to win the toss and condemned Yorkshire to the process of wringing runs out of a green Headingley strip yesterday.
After a rain-obliterated first day Yorkshire achieved a useful total, thanks to ponderous fifties from Byas and Craig White, without ever looking like aspiring champions against a side 34 points ahead of them. The absence of Darren Gough, with a hamstring strain, did not help.
Though the ball often kicked like a jumping bean off the seam and darted about in the air, Mark Butcher, Surrey's third change, inflicted more damage than his specialist colleagues with curving outswingers at medium pace.
Butcher's four-wicket haul was not surprising, given his successful efforts to quell Sri Lanka's batsmen in last weekend's Test at the Oval, and it was interesting that his ``dibbly dobbly'' style - as some would describe it - remained threatening in an era when this sort of bowling was supposed to have been throttled by the England Cricket Board through unfavourable pitches.
Martin Bicknell, an expert in swing and seam, was the expected danger and indeed he made the ball talk, but not loud enough to send more than one batsman packing. With the new ball he passed the outside of the bat, the inside edge and the top of middle stump so often it was ridiculous.
White, back after his three-month injury lay-off, took more than four hours to compile 55, though he needed character to survive the morning session. Byas found a batting tempo equally elusive, so Bradley Parker's aggressive 32 proved the more effective approach.
Ben Hollioake's attempts to join the feast were spoilt by his erratic line, which drew the sting out of his kicking leg-cutters. He did eventually strike twice, when White edged a good delivery to second slip and Gary Fellows touched one down the leg side on his first-class debut.
Fellows, 20, from Len Hutton's old club, Pudsey St Lawrence, was given his chance after a notable season in the second team, though it was something of a poisoned chalice because success was unlikely in such conditions. He was fortunate to avoid getting a quick duck.
Anthony McGrath must have felt relief at being dropped at the end of a second successive write-off of a season since his England A tour to Australia; his 23 championship innings this year had produced only one fifty and a donated innings of 63.
Day 3: Surrey are laid low by Hamilton's telling spells
By Charles Randall at Headingley
Third day of four: Yorkshire (250-9 dec & 151-4) lead Surrey (147) by 254 runs
THE embarrassment accompanying Gavin Hamilton's spectacular late summer form heightened when the Scot sliced through Surrey, the championship leaders, yesterday and took seven wickets for the first time.
Not that Hamilton looked at all apologetic during two venomous spells on this Headingley green-top, which earned Yorkshire a 103-run first-innings lead and a chance to force an important victory if this afternoon's forecast rain holds off.
Yorkshire, fifth, could reduce the gap behind Surrey to 16 points, leaving themselves 21 off the pace if Leicestershire garner maximum points in Birmingham. The title is there to be stolen.
Yesterday, exploiting Surrey's disarray was far from a routine operation for Yorkshire, and in their second innings they were indebted to Craig White for a quality 82 not out in awkward, dark conditions.
White's skill against the moving ball could be gauged from the fact that Michael Vaughan, his opening partner, scratched around for 75 minutes for eight runs and looked fairly relieved when the inevitable edge finally homed into Jon Batty's gloves.
White, much more fluent than he had been during his fifty the previous day, cover-drove with power and precision when given the opportunity, and he launched Saqlain Mushtaq for a long-on six.
Hamilton recently confirmed in writing to the England Cricket Board that he wished to revert to England status after agreeing earlier this summer to represent Scotland in next year's World Cup. He played his first official match as a tartan terror against Bangladesh in July, so the International Cricket Council will presumably require a sensible argument for the double change.
Hamilton's analysis of seven for 50 yesterday was his fourth five-wicket haul or better in Yorkshire's last three matches, on top of five championship fifties since July supplied by robust left-handed batting. His selection by England for October's Super Eights in Perth, a non-ICC tournament, was well merited.
It is not surprising that Hamilton wants to unhitch himself from his Scotland engagement, turning the marriage bus around, as it were, before it reaches Gretna Green. With the ball yesterday he outshone Ben Hollioake.
Surrey lost 10 wickets for 67 runs in 28 overs after Mark Butcher and Ian Ward had put on 80 briskly for the first wicket with skill and resilience that looked like giving their side the upper hand.
Hamilton announced himself by giving Ward a bruise on the inside leg before bending a delivery through a drive by Butcher for the first wicket. The England left-hander's wide stroke range had served him well, and just how well was shortly to be demonstrated.
The edges began to fly as Hamilton, swinging the ball either way, found a line and length that unsettled all the batsmen, and there was no respite at the other end where the fair-haired Matthew Hoggard worked up equally impressive pace.
Hoggard, with an athletic run-up, fired in skidding outswingers as his stock ball with a fairly low arm, and the batsmen, tied down by his accuracy, had to beware the one that went straight on.
Day 4: Silverwood sets Surrey on the slide
By Charles Randall at Headingley
Yorkshire (250-9 dec & 196-4 dec) bt Surrey (147 & 135) by 164 runs
SURREY'S worst fears were realised yesterday when they were demolished by Yorkshire's eager seam attack at Headingley, relinquishing the top place they had held since early May.
There could be no argument about this defeat, which was as one-sided as the margin might suggest. Surrey have been bettered four times in the championship and three of those setbacks have been against their main rivals - Lancashire, Gloucestershire and now Yorkshire.
Adam Hollioake is now confronted with the prospect of a desperate finish to the title race after his Surrey side had led by 41 points in August. Their final match, against Leicestershire at the Oval, is now all the more critical.
Surrey were short of luck in Leeds, but their seam attack was generally outgunned on a grassy strip by the extra pace and vitality of Chris Silverwood, who took five for 30 yesterday, Gavin Hamilton and impressive newcomer Matthew Hoggard.
Yorkshire added 45 quick runs in the morning, with Craig White securing the hundred he deserved, and Surrey were set 300 to win in 88 overs.
Yorkshire's seam bowling would have tested any batsman while the ball curved and nipped around as it did, and the loss of Mark Butcher for a duck in the third over was an accurate indication of how the day would develop. Yorkshire have grown used to Darren Gough's absence through injury or England duty, but rarely could they have produced quite so much collective energy without him.
Ian Ward, usually obdurate, sliced a drive to gully. Then Alec Stewart, a prized wicket for any aspiring bowler, was lured into a drive by Hamilton and snicked it to first slip where White held the chest-high catch.
Alistair Brown completed a low-key match with a duck, Nadeem Shahid was pinned lbw after 90 minutes of defiance and Adam Hollioake, having defended well, drove too early at a slower ball.
Ben Hollioake struck 13 boundaries in 66 balls for 60, his highest championship score of the summer and only his second fifty. His demise was abrupt, Hamilton sending his off-stump on a cartwheel for his 11th wicket of the match.
It was a good day for David Byas, but the odds are still against Yorkshire lifting their first championship title since 1968.