Yorkshire turn the table on Hampshire

If Wednesday's truncated day belonged to Hampshire, the second day of the Frizzell County Championship match against Yorkshire most certainly belonged to the visitors in a day bedevilled by power cuts.

Resuming at their overnight 174-7, Matthew Lumb and Darren Gough continued their partnership with watchful batting and some spirited hitting especially from the England seamer. The 116 run partnership for the 8th wicket put a lot more respectability to the innings. Gough was finally out giving Simon Katich his first wicket for Hampshire, edging him to the wicket-keeper for 72, with three hugh sixes and 8 fours.

Lumb and Ryan Sidebottom crept Yorkshire towards a third batting point, but were undone when Wasim Akram returned to dismiss the tail enders, leaving Lumb unbeaten on 115.

When Hampshire batted it was a different story. John Crawley found his stumps flattened by Chris Silverwood, Simon Katich was needlessly run out by a direct hit for 17, playing 4 delightful boundary strokes that showed his class, and the Derek Kenway was bowled by the fiery red head Steve Kirby for a painstaking 10.

Wickets continued to tumble, as Hampshire feared having to follow on. Robin Smith batted well before edging Kirby and the same bowler had Dimitri Mascarenhas lbw, giving him 3 wickets for two runs in just 14 balls. Perhaps Hampshire were spared when Kirby left the field with recurring back problems, although he did return later.

Hampshire's in form batsman Nic Pothas however, held the attack at bay and shared a 43 run partnership with Wasim Akram and an entertaining one with Shaun Udal to take the home side past the follow on total. Pothas was left 44* when the tail fell giving Yorkshire a useful 118 run first innings lead.

Matthew Wood and Michael Vaughan saw out the last 8 overs of the day with a 141 run advantage.

There was problems off the field during the day, with spectators scratching their heads as first the scoreboard stopped working twice, then the public address system failed to work intermittently, then to top it all the whole Rose Bowl was plunged into a power cut, which meant the scorers computers, scoreboard, public address and the pavilion clock all failed to function. The power returned in time for the end of the days play.