Yorkshire take early control against below-strength champions Durham

Yorkshire are without Tim Bresnan and Ajmal Shahzad, who are taking part in the Twenty20 World Cup, while Durham are missing England Twenty20 captain Paul Collingwood plus injured pace bowlers Steve Harmison, Graham Onions, Callum Thorp and Mitch Claydon.

All things considered, and notwithstanding Bresnan's and Shahzad's unavailability, there is no better time for Yorkshire to be playing the defending champions, who are chasing the first hat-trick of Championship titles since Brian Close's Yorkshire in the late 1960s.

On a one-sided first day at Headingley Carnegie, Andrew Gale's men took full advantage to post 304-2 and raise hopes of a third win in four Championship games.

After Adam Lyth (85) and Joe Sayers (63) added 146 in 40 overs (Yorkshire's third three-figure opening stand in four days after the same pair added 155 against Kent at Canterbury on Saturday and Andrew Gale and Jacques Rudolph 233 against Essex at Chelmsford on Sunday), Anthony McGrath (73 not out) and Rudolph (68 not out) ensured their hard work did not go to waste.

Yorkshire looked like defending champions and Durham like a club who have spent the last four summers battling relegation, with the home team exuding composure and confidence. Only the left-arm spin of Ian Blackwell (2-42 from 27 overs) significantly inconvenienced a Yorkshire side who have again selected two spinners in Adil Rashid and David Wainwright.

On a pitch of limited pace and bounce, Lyth and Sayers were quickly into their stride beneath overcast skies.

Chris Rushworth, a 23-year-old pace bowler making his first-class debut, struggled for control from the Kirkstall Lane end as his first four overs disappeared for 24, Lyth working him neatly through backward-point for four and delicately leg-glancing his next ball to the boundary.

Sayers defended stoutly against the economical Mark Davies and was the perfect foil for the more expansive Lyth, who went to his fourth half-century in successive Championship games from 74 balls with 11 fours.

The only whiff of a chance during a morning session in which the pair added 124 in 33 overs came five minutes before the interval when Sayers pushed a ball from Blackwell to mid-on and set off for a quick single, Liam Plunkett's throw narrowly failing to beat Lyth at the non-striker's end.

So well did the openers bat and so comfortable did they seem it appeared only an unexpected giveaway or an act of God could break their partnership.

As it was, Blackwell suddenly produced a devilish delivery that clipped the edge of Lyth's bat and found its way to Michael Di Venuto at slip. It was a shame for Lyth, who deserved a hundred.

Anthony McGrath strode to the crease fresh from his first Championship half-century for 10 months and picked off some profligate stuff from Plunkett, who bowled like a millionaire from one end while Blackwell bowled like a miser from the other.

When Plunkett pitched short, McGrath pulled him to the foot of the East Stand and then contemptuously flicked him off his legs for four.

On a day when Durham desperately needed Plunkett to "come to the party", as the expression goes, the 25-year-old pace bowler served up too much leg-side stuff which McGrath, in particular, fed on like a predator.

Blackwell had Sayers caught at short-leg with the total on 173 but Rudolph arrived in gloriously confident mood and seemed to make a conscious attempt to knock Blackwell off his stride and prevent him tying Yorkshire down.

The South African took successive boundaries off Blackwell through mid-wicket and mid-on and interspersed his more full-blooded strokes with trademark deft deflections.

Rudolph's half-century arrived from 110 balls with nine fours and he continued on from where he left off at Chelmsford, where he plundered a stylish, unbeaten 101.

McGrath – occasionally becalmed in conditions in which run-scoring was never a cakewalk – sensed perfectly the moments to attack and is on course for his first Championship hundred since his career-best 211 against Warwickshire at Edgbaston last May.

As McGrath and Rudolph walked off at stumps, their splendid partnership worth 131, David Hughes, the ECB pitch inspector, jokingly told the assembled media that he was "more than satisfied."

And so, not for the first time this season, were Yorkshire.