Borthwick ton puts heat on Lancashire

To die wondering might actually be rather pleasant, though it is not something that either Jack Burnham or Neil Wagner is likely to experience.

Drifting away while contemplating pleasant paths, albeit that they have not been walked, may, at most rates, be preferable to mulling over one's earthly demise and pondering what, if anything, is next on one's dance card. However, as Wagner and Burnham went at it hammer and tongs in the first major duel of this game, it was most apparent that their labours were unsparing and that conserving energy had no place in them.

The pair began their battle in the second hour of the morning. By that time both Keaton Jennings and Mark Stoneman had been dismissed, the Durham openers nicking catches off the excellent Tom Bailey; and towards the close, home supporters at a sun-embraced Riverside were applauding Scott Borthwick's high-class 134 and Paul Collingwood's 85 not out, fine innings which had given Lancashire's attack one of its first pick, shovel and prop days at cricket's coalface this season.

Yet it was 19-year-old Burnham who helped take the battle to Lancashire's bowlers, cover-driving Wagner easefully to the boundary in the 25th over and then attempting a rather wilder repeat off the next delivery, only to edge the ball over a leaping Liam Livingstone's outstretched fingers at first slip. In response Wagner sent down a couple of precisely targeted bouncers, although he is not a bowler for whom that over-used tactic is a default position. The second bumper whacked Burnham somewhere in the vicinity of his helmet and it was followed by a discussion between the pair in which Wagner seemed to take the leading role.

He is a curious fellow, Wagner. Off the field he is affable, peaceful, serene. Although he admitted a few weeks ago that he might have to "eliminate" Stuart Broad, he did so with the courteous regret of a James Bond villain. Out in the middle, mind, Wagner spits vengeance and bowls some of the most unsparingly aggressive spells one might see. The history of fast bowling has thrown up similar examples, of course, but rarely is the contrast between the Quaker and the Visigoth as sharp as it is with Mr. Wagner and "Waggy", his on-field persona. Robert Louis Stevenson knew a thing or two.

All the same, Burnham won their battle. At lunch he was 35 not out and had helped Borthwick revive Durham's innings after their early losses. Wagner's seven wicketless overs had cost 32 runs. For his part, Borthwick was batting with gentle ease and his glide though gully off Procter was as well-timed and graceful as anything we saw all day. Neither a cut nor a drive, it seems something of a signature shot for Borthwick and few batsmen play it as well. It will be a stroke for us to play once more when May is a memory.

Having established himself at the wicket and properly gauged the pace of a pitch from which Bailey extracted most bounce, Borthwick unfurled an even greater variety of shots in the afternoon session. There was the precise cover drive which took him to his fifty off 81 balls and the calculated sweep off Simon Kerrigan, which took him into the nineties.

Between those strokes, however, Borthwick lost Burnham, who was caught at slip by Livingstone off Bailey for 44, and Richardson, who edged Kyle Jarvis to the same fielder seven overs later. Both these dismissals bolstered the view that while this is a good batting wicket, it is also a pitch on which seamers can bowl with the hope that their efforts will receive recompense. Certainly home supporters seem likely to rue the absence of Chris Rushworth, whose hip injury prevented his playing in this match.

Richardson was replaced by Collingwood, whose 123-run fifth-wicket stand with Borthwick was clearly the home side's best period of the day. Durham's skipper was confident and assertive against Wagner from the outset, cover-driving his fifth ball to the Lumley Castle boundary and swivel-pulling his next to square leg. A few overs later Collingwood came down the pitch to Kerrigan and hit him sweetly and straight for six, as if confirming home ascendancy. Borthwick responded with similarly assured strokeplay and reached his century off 158 balls with a cover drive off Wagner. Durham took tea on 213 for 4, emboldened in their belief that the next session would belong to them.

So it more or less proved, despite Lancashire's attack sticking to its disciplines and taking two wickets. Borthwick and Collingwood took the score to 274 before Borthwick, in one of his rare miscalculations, tried to hit Kerrigan over long-on but only found Alviro Petersen five yards inside the boundary. Ryan Pringle then batted well enough for his 25 before giving Bailey his fourth wicket when he gloved a pull to Livingstone who dived forward from slip to take the catch.

But by then one's attention was taken by Collingwood, who was batting with ever more circumspection as close of play approached. James Weighell whacked Wagner's last ball of the day over square leg for six but Durham's skipper ended play by patting back a maiden from Kerrigan. His forward defensive shots were as resolute and brimming with resistance as his boundaries had been. Late Collingwood: a cricketer phrased like a vintage.