Ben Hollioake guided Surrey to a comfortable victory over Hampshire on the first day of cricket at the £17m Rose Bowl, more easily achieved than the 23-run margin suggests.

A crowd of around 1,200 watched the first day's play at the new ground and saw a low-scoring game in which Alistair Brown's 33 in the Surrey innings was the best individual total of the match.

Hampshire captain Robin Smith, mindful of the damp wicket and outfield, chose to field first and watched with growing anxiety as Surrey openers Mark Butcher and Ian Ward put on 55 for the first wicket in 15 overs.

But then Neil Johnson, Hampshire's Zimbabwean overseas player, struck with his first delivery for his new employers when he had Ward caught at mid-on by Alex Morris and Surrey were never able to accelerate.

Johnson finished with three for 41 and there were two wickets each for Morris and Shaun Udal as Surrey fell away to 194 all out. Alex Tudor, run out off the last ball of the 50 overs, made an important contribution with 26.

Johnson was out without scoring to the fourth ball from Martin Bicknell's first over of the Hampshire reply and Smith laboured uncharacteristically for 16 overs for his ten.

Ben Hollioake made sure Hampshire failed to recover by dismissing Jason Laney, Dimitri Mascarenhas and John Stephenson in a three-over spell and also held a competent catch to get rid of Will Kendall.

There was some late order resistence from Alex Morris, Adrian Aymes and Udal from 106 for seven but Hampshire never looked capable of overhauling the Surrey total and were 171-9 when they ran out of overs.

Hampshire chief executive Tony Baker said: "We were pleased with the first day's play and the spectators seemed to like the new ground. There is much work still to be done but we are off the mark."

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