Yorkshire v Lancashire: Yorkshire stir Ashes memories as they fight back

The parallels began when Kyle Hogg bowled like a man possessed from the Kirkstall Lane end to take five wickets and help reduce Yorkshire to 45-8 in reply to Lancashire’s first innings 328.

For Kyle Hogg, read Bob Willis.

Rich Pyrah then biffed the ball to all parts during an innings of 117 from 126 balls – his maiden County Championship hundred.

For Rich Pyrah, read Ian Botham.

Pyrah was ably supported by the left-handed Ryan Sidebottom, who smote 52 as his curly hair burst from beneath a blue helmet.

For Ryan Sidebottom, read Graham Dilley.

Although the order of events was demonstrably different, the echoes of the past were impossible to ignore.

Yesterday was the anniversary of Willis’s 8-43, which clinched the most famous comeback win in cricket history.

England beat Australia by 18 runs after being made to follow-on, 227 behind.

Whether Pyrah and Sidebottom’s efforts will be enough to assist Yorkshire to a similarly implausible triumph in their 3000th Championship game remains to be seen, but there cannot have been too many more remarkable days than this during the previous 2999 matches.

Against all odds (perhaps 500-1?), Yorkshire rallied to reach 239, their last two wickets adding 194, before Lancashire closed on 33-3, 122 ahead.

To say Yorkshire were in disarray when Pyrah and Sidebottom joined forces shortly after lunch is an understatement.

Anthony McGrath had just been brilliantly caught by Tom Smith at second slip off Sajid Mahmood and journalists not a million miles from this parish were thumbing records of Yorkshire’s lowest totals.

Fast forward a couple of hours and records of an entirely different nature were being perused: namely, Yorkshire’s highest ninth-wicket stands.

Pyrah and Sidebottom’s partnership of 154 in 30 overs was ninth on the list, the best for Yorkshire at Headingley and only eight runs short of the Roses record by Wilfred Rhodes and Schofield Haigh at Old Trafford in 1904.

One would have to go back a long way – perhaps even 30 years – to find a day of such contrasting and captivating character.

After Yorkshire wrapped up the Lancashire first innings after half-an-hour’s play, the visitors having resumed on 304-7, Hogg annihilated the Yorkshire top-order.

Bowling with decent pace and devilish accuracy, he had Joe Root caught behind for a duck, Jacques Rudolph held in the gully for 12 in his comeback innings, Andrew Gale lbw first ball, Jonny Bairstow lbw driving down the wrong line, and Gary Ballance lbw for a golden duck shouldering arms.

It left Yorkshire reeling on 32-5, which became 35-6 when Smith got in on the act just before lunch when Adil Rashid was lbw.

Minutes after the break, Shahzad was caught behind and McGrath’s vigil ended, by which time Yorkshire’s season had plumbed new depths.

But the seeds of a remarkable recovery were sewn when Smith – having started with five successive maidens – dropped one short to Pyrah, who pulled it into the East Stand for six.

Two balls later, Pyrah found the fine-leg boundary and the scoring rate suddenly accelerated.

Pyrah and Sidebottom raised their fifty stand from just 43 balls, Sidebottom playing one of the shots of the day when he thumped Mahmood straight down the ground towards the Carnegie Pavilion.

Earlier, Sidebottom had wrapped up the Lancashire innings to take 4-68, but he has been almost as valuable to Yorkshire this season as a lower-order batsman.

Pyrah went to his fifty from 37 balls when he helped a ball from Glen Chapple over long-leg for six.

Another maximum followed when he pulled Hogg into the West Stand – a stroke that not only took him past his previous Championship best of 87 against Durham at Headingley in April but which also saw Yorkshire past the follow-on target. It seemed the ninth-wicket pair might never be separated, but Sidebottom went lbw to Chapple in the penultimate over of the afternoon session after making 52 from 103 deliveries.

His dismissal ushered the arrival of Tim Bresnan, who had hot-footed it back from Lord’s after being deemed surplus to requirements for the Test match, with Iain Wardlaw the nominated Yorkshire player to drop out.

Bresnan helped Pyrah to his century and contributed 19 to their last-wicket stand of 40, which ended when Pyrah drove Smith to cover.

Leading by 89, Lancashire were reduced to 3-2 in their second innings as Bresnan had Paul Horton and Stephen Moore caught at second slip by McGrath.

Shahzad had Karl Brown caught behind from a reckless drive in the final over to cap one of the best day’s cricket you could possibly see.