Cool Shantry keeps Worcs from wilting

Worcestershire 283 and 13 for 0 need a further 311 runs to beat Nottinghamshire 240 and 366 (Read 73, Taylor 56, Wessels 55, Shantry 5-48)
Scorecard

At Heathrow on Wednesday, the mercury hit 36.7C, which must have made the queues for customs a lot of fun. It was the hottest July day ever recorded in England. For lovers of irony, the Guardian's hot weather blog had to be temporarily suspended because the servers had overheated. At Wimbledon, strawberries threatened to turn to mush. And at Trent Bridge, where the white stands shone white hot, and the sky was parched blue, Nottinghamshire batted all day in defiance of the relegation gremlins that now cling around their season.

From 115 for 3 overnight, a shaky lead of 72, Nottinghamshire compiled another 251 in 88 overs: the victory target for Worcestershire, the Championship's yo-yo side, a taxing 324. Peter Moores, who has been commandeered on a three-month contract to add pep to Nottinghamshire's dressing room, does not officially start until Friday but had he been at Trent Bridge even he would have foregone a triple espresso for a pint of Trent-Severn tap water and a lie down.

On days like this, the commitment of county professionals is quite something. Every Notts batsman buckled down in turn. Two of them, James Taylor and Luke Fletcher, batted with runners because of hamstring injuries, Fletcher aware that it was to be his last contribution before an expected absence for a month - not what Notts want to hear about the best T20 yorker bowler in the country as the NatWest Blast group stages get down to the business end.

Chris Read's 73 from 122 balls on his return from injury was also a striking effort, a more restrained innings than usual, 31 singles stolen on both sides of the wicket, symptomatic of a placid surface and his own vigour.

But there was one player who stood out most of all on this most enervating of days. Jack Shantry's return of 5 for 48 in 35.4 overs was admirable. In conditions that would have been regarded as a bit on the hot side by a camel train of Bedouin nomads, he went for only four boundaries in the innings, a remarkable feat not just of endurance but nous and accuracy.

We may marvel at Shantry's idiosyncratic action, but there is an artfulness in his bowling that grows more obvious with every season. He made a vital first breakthrough before lunch, ending a painstaking stand of 105 between James Taylor and Riki Wessels when he drew Wessels into a big off-side drive and Joe Clarke dashed back at cover to hold a storming high catch.

Neither did Taylor's careworn half-century reach lunch. His runner, Alex Hales, was short of making his ground, when attempting to complete a third run, and was duly run out by Clarke, completing an excellent morning for the Worcestershire fielder. Taylor stalked off, his pulled hamstring not noticeably restricting his movement as anger suppressed the pain, Hales trailing in a safe distance behind him.

It was as the day drowsed on, though, that Shantry most came into his own. At 327 for 6, Worcestershire were sorely in need of inspiration. Shantry, impeccably accurate, provided it. He fiddled out Brett Hutton lbw after a worthwhile 34, defeated Read on the pull in his next over, and then added Ben Hilfenhaus at first slip. The target was kept in range: just. Clearly, that oddly-put-together action acts as a personal air-conditioning unit.

There was a time, of course, when Saeed Ajmal might have come into his own on such a day. But there will be no repeat of his 63 wickets at 16.47 in nine Championship innings in 2014. Banned in September, cleared in February, he showed no signs of frustration behind his reflective turquoise sunglasses as he was quietly picked off, but one wonders whether he finds his new reality quite ignominious.

"I'd be amazed if it turned," said one regular observer of the Trent Bridge scene as Notts resisted, quite forgetting that Ajmal was in his presence. But this is a different Ajmal, reliant on reputation and changes of flight, arm position or place on the crease. There was no turn. There was just a long shift from a largely innocuous bowler, getting by as best he could and hoping that he might enjoy a few more good days in the sun.