Bowlers toil as Foakes hundred dominates day two
22 August 2015
Surrey took advantage of lovely batting conditions for two sessions to put themselves into a strong position on the second day of this LV Championship fixture at the Bristol County Ground.
Resuming at 74-2, still 159 in arrears, they lost only one wicket in erasing the deficit and when bad light and rain forced the players off shortly after 5 o'clock, Surrey were 349 for 6, a lead of 116 with Ben Foakes having made a career best 140 not out.
Captain Will Tavare used seven bowlers in the day, with two wickets for Noema-Barnett, and one each for Norwell and Jack Taylor.
Listen to Will Tavare's reflections on the day here :
The morning session set the tone for the day with Ben Foakes and night watchman Sam Curran scoring at a good rate from the off. 17 year old Curran, playing in only his third first class match, looked well organised and collected most of his runs throught the covers and mid off with some well timed drives while Foakes, although hit twice on his pads by Fuller, was equally brisk on the scoreboard.
The overhead conditions were much clearer than on the first day, and Fuller and Payne's opening spells produced little threat. Even a long chat between David Payne and umpire Graham Lloyd which led to a change of ball failed to stem a steady flow of boundaries.
Both men played decisively - either well forward or well back - and as a result gradually skipper Will Tavare was forced to change to more defensive fields. A poor call for a third run almost brought about a run out as Norwell hit the stumps at the wicket keeper's end but Curran made his ground and in doing so passed his previous highest first class score.
Foakes brought up his own fifty from 57 balls with nine fours, and the pair had added 100 when Curran cut Howell past point. A maiden first class fifty looked on the cards until he mistimed a drive to Noema-Barnett and was caught at backward point by Payne for 49.
By lunch Foakes was 70 not out, Surrey had scored 119 in the session and at 193-3, the deficit was down to 40.
Steven Davies, who had made two centuries and two scores in the nineties in the group stages of the Royal London Cup, kept Foakes company through the early stages of the afternoon session, when the cloud cover brought a little more indecision from the batsmen.
Fuller tried to hurry Foakes with a series of deliveries short of a length, but he stood firm and it took the introduction of a seventh bowler - Jack Taylor - to break their stand. Davies appeared to have settled in when, on 23 and with Surrey two runs ahead, he left alone a ball which went on with the arm and it knocked out his off stump.
Taylor and Noema-Barnett were proving the most effective of the Gloucestershire attack, but neither could dislodge Foakes, who struck his seventeenth boundary to complete his second first class century of the summer off 139 balls.
With Sam Curran having come in on Friday evening as night watchman, Jason Roy was a handy player to have batting at number six, and he and Foakes added 57 in 13 overs until just before the new ball was due when the economical Noema-Barnett trapped Roy lbw for 39. His slow trudge to the pavilion suggested he thought there was a nick.
Fuller and Norwell shared the new ball until tea, long enough for Norwell to remove Gary Wilson with a smart catch at square leg by Noema-Barnett. At tea, Surrey's lead was 83 with four wickets still in hand.
Fuller and Norwell continued to probe away in the final session but as the light worsened, bowling changes were inevitable and Jack Taylor and Tom Smith were in tandem when thunder rumbled round the ground and the umpires decided to take the players off.
Ben Foakes had carried his bat throughout the day, making 138 with eighteen fours, and it had been a day of toil for the Gloucestershire attack on a flat wicket. The question now is how Surrey tactically approach things with two rain disrupted days forecast for Sunday and Monday.
