Mature McManus rearguard denies Durham

Hampshire 307 (Smith 85, Carberry 73, Rushworth 6-39) and 179 for 9 (McManus 53*, Pringle 5-63, Rushworth 3-39) drew with Durham 421 (Muchall 145, Richardson 91, Arshad 60) and 190 for 4 dec (Stoneman 88, Crane 4-72)
Scorecard

Academy duo Lewis McManus and Mason Crane saved Hampshire from a sixth defeat of the season and handed Durham their first draw, preventing them from reclaiming second spot from Warwickshire. Chris Rushworth took nine wickets in the match - including a hat-trick spread over two innings - but could not quite force victory for Durham.

Hampshire had slumped to 39 for 5 in pursuit 305 for victory as Rushworth and Ryan Pringle carved through the home side's batting. But a 43-run stand between McManus and Joe Gatting steadied Hampshire, before the 20-year-old wicketkeeper and Gareth Berg added 53 for the seventh wicket to frustrate the visitors.

Rain slowed Durham down further, as nine overs were lost to a half-hour shower, allowing allowed McManus, now joined by Jackson Bird, to regroup. Bird and James Tomlinson both fell lbw to Pringle but Crane, on first-class debut, joined McManus in helping to see out the final 5.2 overs with Hampshire nine down, making the most of an uncharacteristic drop from Paul Collingwood.

McManus finished on 53 not out from 166 balls, his maiden first-class fifty, after clipping the final delivery of the match, from Rushworth, for four. The draw all but ended Durham's title dreams and kept Hampshire glued to the bottom of Division One.

"I was looking at surviving those last six balls and getting the team over the line and get a draw but to get that and a half-century at the same time was a bonus," McManus said, after playing in only his second first-class match.

In the morning, teenage legspinner Crane was denied a debut five-for as he took four scalps before Durham declared. Mark Stoneman made sure the board kept moving with an aggressive 88, which included two sixes that cleared the boundary comfortably.

Scott Borthwick was Crane's first wicket of the day, as one turned out the rough to bowl Durham's No. 3 for 39. Australia international John Hastings - who was moved up the order to push the run rate - swung straight into the hands of James Vince, before Stoneman was bowled.

That wicket was enough to persuade Collingwood to declare - setting Hampshire 305 to win in a minimum of 72 overs.

And Hampshire got off to a howler as Michael Carberry edged behind to the first ball of the innings to give Rushworth yet another wicket - and complete a rare hat-trick, with all three wickets occurring in different overs. Rushworth had taken wickets with the final ball of the 109th over and first ball of the 11th over to finish Hampshire's first innings on Tuesday.

Liam Dawson followed the opener after lunch when he was pinned lbw by Rushworth before Jame Vince was also leg before but to Pringle. Adams was the next to depart when he edged behind trying to withdraw his bat to give Rushworth his ninth wicket of a storming match.

Former Durham captain Smith completed a disastrous 4.3 overs in which four wickets and only seven runs were scored when he flicked to Collingwood at slip. But two long stands swung the game back towards Hampshire's grasp as McManus continued his run of scoring his highest score in each of his four first-class innings by classily playing the situation.

Bird was lbw to Pringle - the spinner concluding with career best figures of 5 for 63 - with 8.5 overs remaining to jangle the nerves before Tomlinson fell with less than 15 minutes before the 6pm cut off.

Crane came in and scored his first professional runs - on the day he was given a first professional contract - before Collingwood spilled a regulation slip chance to heighten the suspense. But Hampshire got away with their collapse in tense circumstances.