Yorkshire CCC v Derbyshire, day 4 - Headingley stalemate in race to Lord’s

Both sides have now won two and drawn their other fixture.

With only two games remaining, the race to finish top of the group for potential Lord’s final qualification intensifies.

Only the two best placed group winners from the North, South and Central advance, and Derby have a two-point lead over Yorkshire.

Matches in the Central and South Groups also affect their position, and they were left waiting at close to see if Somerset and Essex could both complete their third successive wins.

While Yorkshire have had the better of a heavily weather-affected fixture which has seen 138 overs lost across four days, Derbyshire dominated the second half of the final day when play began at 2.30pm.

Replying to Yorkshire’s first-innings 400 for six declared, they advanced from 198 for six from 70 overs to close on 300 for seven declared from 107.1.

Critchley (63 off 159 balls) and Dal (78 not out from 115) frustrated the hosts in impressively calm and assured fashion, sharing 104 for the seventh wicket inside 36 overs.

It was Derbyshire’s first ever seventh-wicket century stand achieved in matches at Headingley.

Critchley and Dal came together late on day three (174 for six) with the 201 follow-on target still in doubt.

That was passed three balls into the fourth day when Critchley uppishly drove Duanne Olivier for four, securing a first batting bonus point in the process.

Batting points two and three were to follow, with the added bonus being that they prevented their hosts from sealing a third bowling point which would have come with taking nine wickets.

Critchley and Dal did not encounter too much trouble from the home bowlers in reaching their first fifties of the summer.

Critchley was first to that milestone in the final 20 minutes of the afternoon, off 127 balls with five fours.

Dal was more positive in reaching his fifty shortly after tea off 86 balls with nine fours.

The evening started with 16 overs left to accrue bonus points (245 for six from 94), and Critchley and Dal began to expand.

Yorkshire’s breakthrough came via 19-year-old new ball seamer Dom Leech when he uprooted Critchley’s off-stump, leaving the visitors at 278 for seven in the 101st over.

But when Dal drove Harry Brook through the covers for four to reach 300, the declaration came immediately to end the match.