Now is the time that Surrey need to decide if they should shut up shop. Foakes-Hardie is the last proper partnership - if another wicket goes soon, Yorks are into the tail.
Damn, should be Thompson back for Bess now, too easy for them to slog across the line and get some boundaries
Even before that ball went for 6, it did feel like this was the over. I'm surprised Bess was kept on to bowl it.
Fine margins. We don't quite get over the line against Essex. Surrey do against Yorkshire. Title race is still very much on, but it'll take a lot to stop Surrey. They have Harmer next, but at the Oval not Fortress Chelmsford.
No Overton or Davey should be a big help. Yes Somerset might score big, but hopefully they'll concede more. Plus, it avoids the pain of the two of them stealing the game from us with bat in hand, like they did last year.
Solid enough batting line-up for Yorks (though I'd still just about rather have Lancs'), but a very poor looking bowling line-up. Weakest of the four, and far below Lancs', I would say.
The short straight boundaries should be a good thing for Vince, Whiteley and Fuller. But less so for Prest, Weatherley and - with the ball, most importantly - Crane.
To say Lancs got that wrong would be an understatement. Their main three bowlers (Parkinson, Gleeson and Wood) bowled 9 of the first 12 overs, which left Lancs incredibly vulnerable in those final eight. Yorks cashed in big time. Why would you go so top heavy with your bowlers? And to make it worse, they didn't then give Parkinson his 4th over. His figures of 1-18 stand out amongst the carnage. Fair play to TCK and Thompson, of course. They still needed to score the runs. But Lancs...
The only decent member of Yorks' bowling attack is Shadab. But their problem is that Lancs can choose to see him off, if they want to. They're easily getting the runs off everyone else so far. As expected.
On the one hand it makes me worried about how many Somerset might score on this pitch (the best batting line-up of the four). On the other hand our bowling attack is miles better than Yorkshire's, and a bit better than Lancs' too. Very happy that we're batting first. Removes the risk of Somerset batting us out of the game first innings. And maybe allows Somerset to suffer from scoreboard pressure. But we'll need to score big - no point batting first and only making 150.
I hope today is the day that Vincey and McDermott both score big because it makes a big difference to our total score.
Lammonby regularly impresses me opening the bowling. If we can avoid him swinging one past our defences, then the two of them might be able to cash in.
