Rothesay County Championship, Division One, The Kia Oval, Kennington (day two)
Nottinghamshire 184 & 147-3: Slater 37, Clarke 37*; Worrall 2-18
Surrey 162: Thomas 48, Burns 44; Stone 6-44
Notts (3pts) lead Surrey (3pts) by 169 runs with seven second-innings wickets remaining
Outstanding fast bowling by Olly Stone, who took 6-44, put champions Nottinghamshire in control after two days against Surrey at the Kia Oval.
Surrey lost their last eight wickets for 87 to be dismissed for 162, a first innings deficit of 22.
It was some comeback by Notts who had been 104-8 on day one and they strengthened their position in a lengthy evening session of 45 overs, reaching stumps on 147-3 – a lead of 169.
Pitches atThe Oval tend to become easier to bat on days three and four and Surrey won’t feel they are out of this game if they make early inroads on Saturday.
But in what has been a high-quality tussle between the last two winners of the County Championship it is Nottinghamshire, who held a five-point lead at the top coming into this match, with the advantage, thanks principally to the outstanding Stone.
The 32-year-old, who made the last of his five Test appearances on this ground less than two years ago, bowled a consistently hard length in three spells from the Vauxhall End, challenging both edges of the bat regularly and troubling the batters with occasional steepling bounce.
For the first hour or so, Surrey seemed to be building a position of strength after the early loss of nightwatchman Matthew Fisher, lbw when Brett Hutton swung one into his pads.
Rory Burns timed the ball nicely when he took successive boundaries off Hutton, including a lovely drive down the ground, as he and Adam Thomas carefully negotiated the new ball.
Thomas had some fortune along the way. He was put down by wicketkeeper Kyle Verreynne on 21 and by Freddie McCann at second slip on 29, both off the luckless Hutton.
Their stand had swelled to 59 when Burns loosely upper-cut Stone to deep backward point and Stone and his team grabbed the initiative.
In the same over Ollie Pope, released to play in the game after he was left out of England’s First Test team, was squared up for a five-ball duck.
Josh Blake, substituting for Ryan Patel who injured a finger in the field on day one, averted the hat-trick with a boundary off the splice to third man but Stone had his tail up and struck twice in the same over later in his spell.
The obdurate Thomas, who top scored with 48, was eventually bowled through the gate by a ball which jagged back and debutant Mahipal Lomror edged his first delivery to slip to give Stone his five-for.
When Dillon Pennington took over from Stone, he immediately removed Ben Foakes, who persevered for 48 balls in making 12, with a delivery which straightened and he then picked up Jordan Clark for four.
Blake was caught behind propping forward to left-arm spinner Liam Patterson-White, whose first-innings 76 now looks even more important, and Stone returned to collect his sixth wicket when he bowled Tom Lawes (18) with another delivery which nipped away off the seam.
Surrey needed to strike early and Dan Worrall obliged in his third over when skipper Haseeb Hameed misjudged the line to lose his off-stump for four.
Ben Slater and McCann carefully added 49 for the second wicket but McCann (22) was caught behind via an inside edge off Fisher.
Worrall came back for a second spell and produced a beauty to remove Slater for 37, the ball angling in on middle and leg-stump before nipping off the seam to find the outside edge.
But Joe Clarke and Jack Haynes safely negotiated the last 20 overs to ensure Stone’s toil earlier in the day was not in vain, with an unbroken partnership of 70.
Report by ECB Reporters Network, supported by Rothesay
