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Cricket latest: Yorkshire press home advantage
YORKSHIRE continued to enjoy the better of proceedings against Championship leaders Durham at Headingley.
After claiming four wickets in the morning session to reduce the champions to 73-4, the White Rose county struck three further blows in the afternoon to maintain the pressure.
Only stand-in captain Dale Benkenstein, who won the toss, offered any resistance with a unbeaten 55 as Durham were restricted to 171-7 from 64 overs at tea.
It took just four overs of the afternoon session for Yorkshire to make another breakthrough when Ian Blackwell was bowled by a delivery from Adil Rashid that the young England international pushed through.
Blackwell's departure at 82-5 was then followed a little over half-an-hour later by Phil Mustard losing his wicket when edging Rana Naved-ul-Hasan to Jacques Rudolph at first slip.
Benkenstein tried valiantly to kick-start his side's innings by crashing 16 off one over from Naved only for the very next over to see Durham lose their seventh wicket.
Liam Plunkett was the man in question adjudged – rather harshly, it has to be said – to be leg before from a delivery from Shahzad that seemed to be very high.
It left the visitors on 128-7 from 49 overs but Benkenstein continued to defy the home side by moving on to an unbeaten 55 from 120 deliveries by the interval.
Durham had slumped from 47 without loss to 62-4 at one stage before rallying slightly to reach 73 by the interval after winning the toss.
After a slow start to the game in which the Durham openers had been largely untroubled, the home side's breakthrough came from the final delivery of the 17th over when Mark Stoneman nudged the ball to mid-off and set off for a quick single.
Anthony McGrath was, however, too quick for the Durham opener with a direct hit on the stumps ensuring Stoneman's time at the crease was over.
A second wicket fell just six runs and 13 minutes later when Kyle Coetzer edged a delivery from Shahzad and Jonathan Bairstow took the catch low to his right.
The Bradford-born bowler then made it two wickets in as many overs when he trapped Gordon Muchall in front of his stumps for a second ball duck to leave the visitors teetering on 55-3.
Durham's woes were not over, either, with Michael Di Venuto being the fourth man out with the total on 62 - bowled by Adil Rashid after hitting 29 runs from 73 deliveries.
The flurry of wickers were just the lift the home side needed after an opening hour or so in which their bowling attack had largely struggled to trouble either Stoneman or Michael Di Venuto.
Matthew Hoggard, in particular, was guilty of bowling too wide and giving the two openers the option of leaving plenty of deliveries alone.
The introduction of Shahzad changed all that, however, to leave Yorkshire firmly on top at lunch.
The hosts, searching for their first Championship win in more than a year, had Tim Bresnan and Rashid back in the side after their return from England duty, while Rana Naved-ul-Hasan also returned after a spell out with a hip injury.
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Weather for Yorkshire
Friday 25 May 2012
Today
Sunny
Temperature: 10 C to 23 C
Wind Speed: 20 mph
Wind direction: East
Tomorrow
Sunny
Temperature: 8 C to 20 C
Wind Speed: 16 mph
Wind direction: East
