England hopeful Emilio Gay made a statement with an unbeaten 159 for Durham to see off James Anderson’s Lancashire, who were denied a spinner by the championship’s latest substitutions farce.
Gay is one of the candidates to replace the doomed Zak Crawley as England’s Test opener, even though he bats No 3 at county level. His innings, in an unbroken partnership of 290 with South Africa’s David Bedingham, helped Durham chase an epic 336 just two wickets down against their promotion rivals Lancashire.
While this match took place in Division Two, the quality of the two sides was of first division standard. Gay had to defy Anderson, easily the championship’s leading wicket-taker after four rounds, and Mitch Stanley, the lively tearaway who is an outside chance of a Test debut this summer. It was a knock of high class in which he moved through the gears: cautious to start, with a Durham defeat a distinct possibility, before opening his shoulders with the finish line in sight.
That cause was helped by Lancashire’s lack of a front-line spinner as they found themselves entangled in a farcical substitutes drama for the second match in succession.
When Arav Shetty, their young off-spinning all-rounder, went down with a broken thumb, they applied to bring in the England spinner Tom Hartley.
The request was denied, on the grounds that Hartley, 26, was too experienced to be deemed like-for-like. Instead, wicketkeeper-batsman George Bell came into the XI and at the end of the match was bowling spin alongside Tom Bailey, who is usually a seamer but turned to off-breaks.
That is the same Tom Bailey who was not allowed to replace a fellow right-arm seamer Ajeet Singh Dale at Bristol in the last round because he was too experienced and his statistics were too good.
The decision also denied Hartley, an England Lion with Gay this winter, the opportunity to win a match for his county on the final day. This is not to say spin would have made a huge difference – Durham’s spinner Callum Parkinson took just one wicket – but it would have provided Anderson with an opportunity to hold up an end. The whole situation brings further focus on the well-intentioned but poorly applied substitutes trial.
That is not to take anything away from Gay’s innings. He is an opener batting No 3 because Durham have the veteran Alex Lees and local lad Ben McKinney opening. When Lees was bowled leaving Stanley and McKinney played down the wrong line to George Balderson, Durham were in big trouble. But Gay is 26, and this was his 70th first-class match; he had the maturity to guide his team through choppy waters. While McKinney made a magnificent 244 against Gloucestershire, he has failed to back it up against the class of Lancashire.
Gay has. This was his 12th first-class hundred, and second of the season; only he and Surrey’s Jamie Smith have multiple centuries batting in the top three so far this summer. Alongside James Rew, they are the form English batsmen in the championship. They could all find themselves in the Test squad to face New Zealand in June.
April has produced a glut of runs, as this round showed: Division One provided four bore draws, arguably the worst at the Oval, where Rory Burns, Dom Sibley and Ben Foakes bowled 15 overs between them as Essex batted out the final day with ease.
At one stage, Durham were 124 for seven in their first innings, and 246 behind. They managed to trim the deficit to 75 on first innings, then limit their target to an achievable 336. By winning, Durham move three points behind Lancashire, who have played a match more.
There was another significant result in Division Two. After three soul-sapping losses, Gloucestershire notched a fine win, by 10 wickets, over Derbyshire.