Rothesay County Championship, Division One, Cooper Associates County Ground, Taunton (day four)
Surrey 422: Lawrence 139 & 127-5: Gorantla 28; Gregory 2-22
Somerset 731: Abell 307, Lammonby 229, Pretorius 84; Lomror 4-212
Somerset (13 pts) drew with Surrey (12 pts)
Tom Abell became the eighth Somerset player to score a first-class triple century before the County Championship Division One match with Surrey ended in a draw.
The hosts extended their overnight first innings score of 691-8 to 731 all out – the second-highest total in their history.
Abell was the last man out for 307 off 407 balls, having struck 31 fours and eight sixes in an innings spanning more than nine hours, while Migael Pretorius contributed 84 to a ninth-wicket stand of 195, a Somerset record.
Surrey’s second innings was twice interrupted by rain. They closed on 127-5 and took 12 points from the game, while Somerset claimed 13.
Somerset elected to bat on at the start of play, giving Abell the chance to convert his 284 not out into a triple hundred. He raised 700 with a single off Mahipal Lomror and then cleared the ropes for the eighth time off the same bowler.
Soon, Somerset had overtaken their previous second-highest total of 705-9, made against Hampshire at Taunton in 2003.
When the stand with Pretorius, worth 159 overnight, passed 183 it became a Somerset ninth-wicket record, previously held jointly by Chris Greetham and Harold Stephenson against Leicestershire at Weston-super-Mare in 1963 and Chris Tavare and Neil Mallender versus Sussex at Hove in 1990.
Abell’s 300 was reached with a single to third man off Dan Worrall, the 402nd ball of his innings. He joined an illustrious group of Somerset triple centurions, already comprising Harold Gimblett, Sir Vivian Richards, Jimmy Cook, Graeme Smith, Justin Langer, James Hildreth and Tom Banton.
Pretorius had leant entertaining support but the South African’s hopes of reaching three figures from an overnight 72 not out ended when he fell lbw to Worrall, having faced 83 balls and hit nine fours and four sixes. The partnership with Abell had occupied just 25.1 overs.
Abell was within two runs of becoming the top run-scorer in the top division this season when skying a catch to long-on off Reece Topley. It meant his final tally of runs was 1,287, one fewer than Nottinghamshire’s Joe Clarke.
Somerset led by 309. Soon Abell was showing a safe pair of hands at second slip, taking a comfortable catch offered by Dom Sibley off Lewis Gregory. It was 23-2 when Somerset’s skipper struck again, bowling Ryan Patel for 10 off an inside edge.
Ollie Pope, on five, survived a sharp chance to Tom Lammonby at silly point off Archie Vaughan as Surrey’s top order had to contend with heavy cloud cover. At 48-2, the umpires ordered the floodlights on and Somerset bowled spin at both ends, Vaughan operating in tandem with Jack Leach.
It became 52-3 on the stroke of lunch when Pope, to his obvious dismay, was given out caught at short-leg off bat and pad to reward an impressive spell by the off-spinner Vaughan from the River End.
After the first rain-break, Vaughan removed Rory Burns on 25 pushing forward and edging to slip. Nik Gorantla had opened his account of first-class runs with a boundary, but soon the players were heading off again as another shower brought an early tea.
With Surrey 68-4, 241 behind and with a possible 36.2 overs left in the day, Somerset still had a chance of forcing victory in the final session.
On 25, Gorantla had a moment of fortune when a delivery from Vaughan struck his leg, the ball rolling onto the stumps without dislodging a bail.
Vaughan had switched ends with Leach, who then had Gorantla caught at slip for 28, but Ben Foakes batted solidly and found a reliable partner in Lomror as they saw Surrey safely to stumps.
ECB Reporters’ Network supported by Rothesay.
Somerset captain Lewis Gregory:
“I don’t think there is a reason why we can’t get over the line other than it is a bloody difficult competition to win.
“We have some amazing cricketers in our squad and are heading in a great direction, with some young players who will be better for what they have done this season.
“We can look forward to next season with great confidence. The support we get is fantastic and this is a wonderful place to play cricket.”
Surrey skipper Rory Burns:
“It has been a tough old game for us. Somerset played very well and the positive is that we saw things out today and emerged with a draw.
“It has been a tough season for us. It’s not where we wanted to end up in the Championship and we have had some pretty tough days over the course of it.
“There have been some good learning experiences. I haven’t had time to fully reflect yet, but that is something I will do over the next month or so.”
