Victoria all but certain of Pura Cup win

Queensland 275 (Maher 72, Love 65*, White 4-66) and 2 for 56 need 520 more runs to beat Victoria 710 and 1 for 140 dec (Arnberger 72, Elliott 55*)
Scorecard

After four days of clubbing records, Victoria set Queensland the biggest of them all - pull off the biggest run-chase in 110 years of domestic cricket to win the Pura Cup. Queensland began their second innings needing 576 to win, and stumbled to 2 for 56 by the end of the fourth day.

With a Queensland victory as close to an impossibility as sport can produce, Victoria appeared certain to seal their first first-class title since 1990-91. The wickets of Jimmy Maher (0) and Martin Love (14) made it even more likely that, on a wearing pitch on the fifth day, Victoria would have no trouble finishing things off.

Not content with posting a monumental 710 in their first innings, Victoria bowled out Queensland for 275 and then, instead of enforcing the follow-on, batted again. Perhaps chasing revenge for years of away losses to Queensland, Victorian captain Darren Berry opted to inflict more misery on the bowlers and let Matthew Elliott and Jason Arnberger slog for two hours.

Berry's declaration at 1 for 140 left Queensland a victory target of 576 in 105 overs and any whiff of a successful chase disappeared on the first ball when Michael Lewis had Maher brilliantly caught at first slip by Cameron White, who dived to his right and stuck out a right hand after the ball bounced off Berry's left glove.

Lewis then bowled Love before Queensland steadied to 2 for 56 at stumps, with Clinton Perren 32 not out and Stuart Law 8 not out, with another 520 runs required.

Berry's decision to bat again raised eyebrows but allowed his bowlers to freshen, as the left-arm fast bowler, Allan Wise, was missing from the roster because of stress fractures in his left foot. It also allowed Elliott (55 not out) and Arnberger (72) to post their second 100-plus partnership of this game.

Arnberger was savage on Nathan Hauritz, smashing three successive sixes and a four off his sixth over. Elliott broke another record, this time for the most runs in a first-class season by a Victorian batsman - if one includes his 48 against the touring Indians.

He finished the season with 1,429 runs - the most by a Victorian and the most by any player in a Sheffield Shield/Pura Cup season (1,377). Law, who will bow out of Australian first-class cricket at the end of this match, after 16 seasons, was given a guard of honour off the ground by his teammates after Victoria's declaration.

"I was trudging off [thinking], 'Thank Christ we're not fielding again', and all of a sudden I look up and see my teammates and I'm still in the middle of the pitch," he said. "Our guys have been brilliant to me all year, I've had four or five farewells now in different situations and we just kept managing to get another game in.

"It was special, it meant a lot to me, it means I've got respect from a lot of people who've played with me and against me."