Warwickshire sniff second place

Warwickshire 573 for 9 dec (Hain 208, Trott 164, Chopra 53, Middlebrook 5-124) beat Northamptonshire 273 (Kettleborough 71, Duckett 55, Hannon-Dalby 4-57, Barker 4-61) and 284 (Duckett 71, Barker 4-47) by an innings and 16 runs
Scorecard

Warwickshire moved into second place in the LV= County Championship table and into pole position to secure runners-up spot with a crushing innings-and-16-runs victory over Northamptonshire at Edgbaston.

Warwickshire's slim chances of winning the Championship disappeared when Yorkshire clinched the title with victory over Nottinghamshire at Trent Bridge shortly before midday.

But they stayed on course for second prize by wrapping up their own victory 75 minutes later. Warwickshire's win took them above Nottinghamshire in the table and they could secure the runners-up place next week if Nottinghamshire fail to beat Sussex at Trent Bridge.

Northamptonshire's defeat was their 11th in 14 matches in a wretched season and their seventh by an innings and the only bright spot was another innings of promise from Ben Duckett.

The former England Under-19 captain followed up last week's maiden century against Somerset with a busy 71 but it was not enough to make Warwickshire bat again as they were dismissed for 284 in their second innings.

The brilliant sunshine of the first three days was replaced by overcast conditions for the first 30 minutes but Warwickshire had to wait nine overs for their breakthrough when James Middlebrook found himself cramped trying to cut Keith Barker and he played on for 27.

David Willey, who bowled only four overs in Warwickshire's first innings of 573 for nine declared before he broke down with a back problem, replaced Middlebrook and he initially curbed his attacking instincts.

He took 16 balls to get off the mark and broke a sequence of five successive maidens from Barker, Rikki Clarke and Jeetan Patel when he squirted Clarke for a single. But Willey soon lost patience and holed out to Barker at mid-on when he went down the pitch to Patel.

Duckett played positively and struck 12 fours in his 91-ball innings but then inside-edged Oliver Hannon-Dalby to wicketkeeper Tim Ambrose. Andrew Hall, who will be released by Northamptonshire at the end of the season, prolonged the resistance with a stubborn 31 but he was bowled driving at Barker to the second ball after umpires Nick Cook and Tim Robinson had decided to delay the lunch interval for 15 minutes.

Neil Wagner pulled Hannon-Dalby for six and Mohammad Azharullah top edged a pull off Chris Woakes for another six over the slips in the last acts of defiance.

The lunch interval was further delayed with Northamptonshire nine wickets down but not for long as Wagner picked out Jonathan Trott at long-on off Barker, who finished with 4 for 47 from 20.2 overs.