Curran flattens Gloucestershire after Foakes ton

Gloucestershire 102 for 7 (Curran 5-17) trail Surrey 448 (Foakes 118, Elgar 98, Ansari 64, Batty 50, Norwell 5-112) by 346 runs
Scorecard

Ben Foakes and Tom Curran shared the honours as Surrey stepped up their LV= County Championship promotion challenge by taking complete control of their game against Gloucestershire at the Kia Oval.

Foakes, the 22-year-old England Lions wicketkeeper-batsman, scored 118 - his fourth first-class century but first since joining Surrey from Essex at the end of last season - to lead his side to an intimidating first innings total of 448.

Then paceman Curran, 20, took 5 for 17 off 10 overs to help reduce Gloucestershire to 102 for 7 by the close of the second day

It was slow going at first as Foakes, 57 overnight, and Gary Wilson, the Ireland wicketkeeper who is keeping in this match, took their sixth-wicket partnership to 83 before Wilson was well caught by Will Tavare at third slip off Liam Norwell for 37.

At that stage, Foakes had gone 12 overs without scoring a run but he got going again in a seventh-wicket stand of 46 with James Burke, who had made 18 when he was leg before to James Fuller, back in the Gloucestershire attack with a heavily bandaged left hand after cutting it when he made a diving stop the day before.

Foakes went on to complete his hundred off his 188th ball when he tried to cut Norwell and edged over a leaping Michael Klinger at first slip for his 12th four. After that the runs began to flow.

Gareth Batty plundered 50 off 43 balls, including eight fours, as 80 runs came from 16 overs for the eighth wicket before the deserving Norwell had both Batty and Foakes caught at mid-on to finish with a creditable 5 for 112 from 34.5 overs.

Then Curran, son of the late Zimbabwe and Gloucestershire allrounder Kevin, showed why he is already on England's radar.

He had Chris Dent caught behind in his first over and then, just as Tavare and Klinger were threatening to give Gloucestershire some kind of foundation, he bowled them both in successive overs.

In his next over, Curran had Ian Cockbain caught at mid-on to leave the youngster with 4 for 9 in his first six overs.

And there was no respite when he gave way to Burke, who promptly stuck up his left hand to take a return catch from Benny Howell.

Gloucestershire were reeling at 50 for 5 and although Hamish Marshall and Geraint Jones put on a brave face in a sixth-wicket stand of 47, Burke broke it by bowling Jones for 30 and Curran returned to bowl Jack Taylor with the last ball of the day, leaving Marshall unbeaten on 30.