Trott century fails to stifle Gosforth party

A superb century by Jonathan Trott was not enough to guide Warwickshire to a third successive win in the Royal London Cup as they lost by five wickets to Durham at South Northumberland CC.

The match was staged in the Newcastle suburb of Gosforth as part of the club's 150th anniversary celebrations and, unsure how the pitch would play, Durham's one-day captain Mark Stoneman put the visitors in.

Trott's 103-ball century took them to 213 for 2 with 10 overs left, but he departed to the first ball of the 41st and the innings fell apart as they were all out for 264 with two balls unused. John Hastings used his slower ball to good effect in taking 5 for 46.

Half-centuries from Stoneman and Paul Collingwood, backed up by good contributions from Phil Mustard and Calum MacLeod, saw Durham to victory with almost four overs to spare.

It was tough on Trott, who went to the crease at 25 for 1 after eight overs and made batting look very easy.

There was never any hint of slogging and the only time he cut loose was immediately after Tim Ambrose, on 17, hit a four off Gareth Breese via Collingwood's fingertips at short mid-wicket. Having just bowled a very tidy over, Collingwood continued but three of his next four balls were pulled for four.

Ambrose should have been out for 26, when he went down the track to Breese and Mustard fluffed the stumping chance.

But the stand was worth 141 in 23 overs when Hastings floated up a much slower ball well wide of off stump and in reaching to run it through point, Trott got a big inside edge into his stumps. He hit 14 fours in making 106 off 108 balls.

Two overs later Ambrose fell for 70 when he pulled Stokes to deep backward square leg and the rest of the innings subsided, leaving Warwickshire 30 short of what had looked likely.

Still without Chris Wright and Keith Barker, as well as England's Chris Woakes, Warwickshire again opened up with Oliver Hannon-Dalby and once he had conceded 33 in five overs Durham were well underway.

Stoneman (50) and Mustard (42) put on 88 in 15 overs then MacLeod made 46 against his former county.

Only Ben Stokes missed the boat, falling for six when he top-edged a sweep to short fine leg - though Collingwood might have gone for two when he edged Boyd Rankin and Varun Chopra missed the chance just to his right at slip.

Shortly afterwards Collingwood pulled Ateeq Javid for six and he later drove the off-spinner over the rope at long-on to reach 50 off 51 balls.

He tried to finish the match in a hurry, hitting the first two balls of the 45th over for four and six off Hannon-Dalby before driving a catch to mid-off.

Collingwood made 77 off 65 balls and with only 14 more needed, Durham eased to their first win in the competition when Gordon Muchall hit the first ball of the 47th over for four.