Pothas and Crawley punish Notts

Hampshire 345 for 5 (Pothas 117, Crawley 103*, Mascarenhas 16*) v Nottinghamshire
Scorecard

John Crawley used all his experience to anchor the Hampshire recovery © Getty Images

Nottinghamshire's defence of the Championship title is certainly not going to plan. It probably isn't too early too say that a battle against relegation is looking more likely than a fight for back-to-back pennants. They started well enough at The Rose Bowl, with four wickets before lunch, but there was precious little else for them to enjoy while John Crawley and Nic Pothas combined in a stand of 217, scotching the notion that batsman can't prosper on the ground.

The pair went about their task of rebuilding the innings from 92 for 4 in contrasting styles. Crawley basically kept the bowling out for the first session, but Pothas was more positive and quickly caught up with Crawley in the run stakes. Nottinghamshire, though, had a chance to remove him when Pothas slashed to Jason Gallian, head high, in the gully but it was palmed over the bar. Hampshire would have been five down for less than 100; Nottinghamshire were left to rue their mistake.

As the early zip from the new ball disappeared, during the afternoon session, the batsmen took charge against a thin Nottinghamshire attack missing Ryan Sidebottom and Greg Smith. The bowlers' early accuracy disappeared and Pothas, especially, was quick to latch onto anything short, wide or full. He peppered the offside with his favourite drives and cuts. From having a field of three slips, Stephen Fleming had to resort to a deep cover-point to stem the flow of boundaries while Pothas was handed a second life when Andy Harris spilled a low caught-and-bowled opportunity.

The century, his second of the season, arrived from 198 balls and was another of the rescue acts that Pothas is renowned for on the south coast. The stroke to reach a hundred was probably Pothas' least convincing of the innings as he was squared up and edged low to Chris Read's right. On another day Read would have clung on, but it wasn't to be for Nottinghamshire.

Pothas was just settling in again when the second new ball became available. Fleming couldn't take it fast enough and the decision paid dividends when Pothas played around a straight one from Harris. But they couldn't repeat the multiple strikes of the morning session as Dimitri Mascarenhas started brightly.

Crawley is far too experienced to get caught up in a race with his partner and was quite content to move along at his own pace. He is not shy of scoring runs against Nottinghamshire with two triple centuries to his name against them and showed a similar appetite with this effort. He ticked over to three figures shortly before the close and given his record of large hundreds (never mind doubles and triples) he'll want to build on his overnight score.

The early exchanges had gone to type for a ground that a pitch inspector recently joked he should call home. There was movement for Harris and Charlie Shreck with Harris producing an impressive first spell which brought the wickets of Michael Carberry and James Adams. But with Crawley bedding in for the long haul the other batsmen opted for attack. Dominic Thornely raced to 19 off 10 balls with a flurry of shots against Shreck, but the bowler had his revenge with a perfect delivery which held its line and took the edge.

When Sean Ervine, the powerful Zimbabwean allrounder, slashed to gully Nottinghamshire were in prime position to turnaround their poor start to the season. But they couldn't maintain the pressure, missed their chances, and were made to pay. Shane Warne hasn't even taken the field yet.