Haseeb Hameed made a superb double hundred but his Nottinghamshire side’s chance of denying Surrey a fourth consecutive Division One title are receding with their contest with Somerset almost certain to end in a draw.
With half-centuries from Jack Haynes (70) and Lyndon James (72), Nottinghamshire finished day three at 511-6 in their first innings for a lead of 73. Yet the combination of a dead pitch and the Kookaburra ball seems to have left no realistic route to a positive result on the final day.
They began this round – the 11th of the 14 – a point behind Surrey but the latter’s victory against Durham at Chester-le-Street puts clear daylight between them and the chasing pack, although Nottinghamshire still have to go to the Kia Oval in September. Somerset, in third place, arguably need nothing less than a win here to maintain their outside chance.
Unless Nottinghamshire can rapidly extend their lead to a couple of hundred on the final morning, and then bowl out Somerset, which seems highly improbable, all four of Nottinghamshire’s matches using the Kookaburra ball will have ended in stalemate.
Somerset’s verdict on the conditions was made evident by skipper Lewis Gregory’s decision not to bother with the second new ball, spinner Archie Vaughan bowling the final delivery of the day with a ball that was 151 overs old.
Hameed’s 208 – which ended, to his misfortune, when he was run out responding to a team-mate’s call – takes his tally for the season to 1,108 as the leading run-scorer in the County Championship.
A day that will not stay long in the memory began with Nottinghamshire cutting 82 runs from an overnight deficit of 249 and losing one wicket when Joe Clarke chipped Gregory to short midwicket for 42.
The afternoon was a little more entertaining, mainly for Craig Overton assuming the role of pantomime villain in his efforts to unseat Hameed, largely by bowling a legside line, often banging the ball in short.
Frustrated when the Nottinghamshire skipper was almost out on 137 immediately after lunch – edging wide enough for wicketkeeper James Rew to reach the ball with his fingertips but not catch it – Overton had metaphorical steam emerging from his ears when Hameed’s failed attempt to pull him on 152 ended with the opener desperately trying to kick the ball away from his stumps as it dropped over his shoulder.
Hameed survived again. He had gone past 150 in an innings for the fourth time in his career and appeared as unflappable as ever.
Amid all this, his counterpart Gregory appeared to have decided that taking the second new ball would aid only the batting side in providing more pace on to the bat from a pitch that itself had none to offer.
Nonetheless, the fourth wicket partnership of Hameed and Haynes was able to achieve enough acceleration to claim three batting bonus points within the 110-over specified time, giving them five from the match to Somerset’s four, Haynes then becoming the sole casualty of the afternoon, his dismissal to Gregory almost a duplicate of Clarke’s.
They had added 123, and with James, a double centurion himself only last week, now at the other end, Hameed might have envisaged another profitable alliance as Nottinghamshire sought to end the day with the upper hand.
In the event, after lifting Vaughan gloriously over long-off to complete his third career double-ton with a 23rd four to go with two earlier sixes, Hameed was soon gone, although through no fault of his own, run out brilliantly by the combination of Tom Lammonby and Rew after James had called him through for a single to extra cover.
James played nicely again, adding 88 with Liam Patterson-White for the sixth wicket before he was caught on the midwicket boundary.
