Cameron: his heart will go on...

It’s such a pleasant change to see positive things happen at New Road. In recent years the club has been flooded at least twice, on one occasion to the extent where Olympic triathlon swimming could comfortably have been trialled at the ground. There have been all kinds of reports of unrest amongst players, with some of them – including Gareth Batty – having gone off to pastures new (or not so new in Batty’s case). With all of that to one side, how refreshing to see young Mr Cameron doing so well in the Worcestershire cause. When I say Cameron, I don’t mean the PM. He has enough trouble trying to remember who the England cricket team are, let alone knowing which end of a bat is which...

It’s been an odd day as far as I can tell, in terms of where we are in the game. Both teams will be feeling quietly satisfied. Firstly, Worcestershire would win bragging rights for winning the toss and batting first. But then Surrey would have felt insanely smug at having the hosts down at 106-5! These little twisty, turny sessions have produced a rather intriguing little scenario in that whilst the morning belonged to Surrey, the afternoon definitely went to Worcs. A fiendish partnership involving the aforementioned Cameron developed, sticking harder than a piece of chewing gum to one of Mark Ramprakash’s bats!

Tremlett stole the bowling honours with his four wickets today, in the same way that Cameron did for the Worcestershire batting. If there’s a better opening bowler in the county game at the moment I’ve not seen him. Again, I didn’t hear the majority of the game because muggins was up to my eyes in dead people (genealogy, before people think I work in a ‘Silent Witness’ capacity), but it looks like there may have been one or two slightly silly shots offered by the Worcestershire batsmen in the morning session given the score. Mitchell fell for 5 runs, care of Tremlett. Then it was the turn of the lovely Rampant favourite Solanki for 37, bowled by Batty, and 13 proved unlucky for Moeen Ali, who was out lbw to Batty. At 83-3 Surrey must have been feeling mighty pleased with themselves!

The situation was almost instantly made even better when Kervezee stumbled to a six ball duck with only one further run added to the score. And when Shakib was bowled by Tremlett for 18, another notch on the Surrey smug-ometer must have been reached!

The period immediately after lunch often seems to be the real danger to Surrey when bowling. I wouldn’t say they let the game get away from them, as the batting between Cameron and Wheeldon was very fine, but it does seem to be an Achilles heel for the south London team. Do they have too many sticky toffee puddings at dinner time? Are they too stuffed full of munchies? I’m only saying this because twenty minutes after my own lunch I have to fight the urge not to fall asleep with my head on the keyboard...

Compare the situation before and after. The last wicket to fall before lunch was the fifth, for 106. The next one fell with the score at 211! That is one heck of a comeback (doffs cap in admiration) from Worcestershire. Surrey huffed and puffed but the wickets still stood until the departure of Wheeldon for 65, given lbw to Dernbach. To rub more salt into the wound, Cameron and Cox then continued where Wheeldon left off! Cox did well in keeping Cameron company whilst the latter crept slowly towards his highest ever batting total. I shouldn’t really be cheering on the opposition, but I confess in this case I did. Just a little cheer.

I gave a bigger one when Cox went for 18, lbw to Batty.

There was of course the chance that Cameron would reach his first ever first class century, but as fate would have it he fell four short, thanks to some acrobatics from Stewart Walters, who juggled the ball for a while before finally taking the catch!

Surrey can take pride in two things. I’ve already mentioned on a few occasions the meteoric improvement in the Surrey fielding, to the extent where they’ve gone from zeros to heroes in this field (pardon the pun). If there was a graph denoting the improvement from two years ago, say, starting at a level equal to the black hole of Calcutta, the big, red squiggly line would show we’re currently scaling the summit of Ben Nevis! A pie chart would similarly denote a very satisfying portion showing Surrey doing very nicely, probably comparing favourably with other counties. Of course, Surrey have a young and fit squad, which helps. Even Ramps on the verge of 41 is incredibly fit. I have the feeling that, much as we love him, having someone like Cosgrove in the side might not help in terms of fielding statistics. If he saw a pie chart, god love him, he’d probably eat it...

But the real improvement is the bowling. By and large we are now looking like a side that is going to bowl the opposition out twice in a game. Tremlett has been a fairly dynamic cog in the wheel, but Batty too (who I know gets a lot of stick from some Surrey fans in certain quarters) is starting to reap the rewards of his hard graft. Dernbach, returning from injury having started so well, is now looking like he’s shaken the rust from his bowling arm. Imagine a side that could have had a fit Andre Nel and Chris Jordan, as well as Meaker! Now you’re talking!

Andrew, who had replaced Cox as Cameron’s perfect foil, must have felt a little lonely without his friend as he fell four runs later with the score on exactly 300, bowled by Dernbach for 24. That left the final pair to be mopped up, with Tremlett fittingly picking up the scalp of Mason for 4, leaving Shantry not out, also on 4.
It’s a bit difficult to know how Surrey would have felt about having four or so overs at the end of the day to see off, but I guess that’s what happens when you knock over the opposition late on. Would they have sent out a night watchman if one of the openers had gone, to protect Ramps’ wicket? I’m not sure Mr R has much time for night watchmen to be honest. What happens when your night watchman’s wicket falls? Do you send out another? And what happens if he goes too???

It was a question that thankfully didn’t need answering, as both Lancefield and Harinath (who we’ll probably be sticking with as poor Michael Brown is confirmed out for the rest of the season) stuck dutifully to their wickets, with Lancefield not out on 7 and Harinath not out on 1. Fingers are well and truly crossed that they stick around long enough to take the sting out the ball tomorrow. It would be nice to see the opening partnership succeed: it showed signs of promise in the Sussex game.

Of course, with less than 300 runs now to get to equal the Worcestershire total, the real question is whether or not the rain is going to play havoc with the game like it did against Sussex. At the time of writing this it doesn’t look hopeful!

On a slightly different tack, the BBC headlines proclaims “Drink-driving Swann blames cat.’

Come on. How’s it’s feet supposed to reach the pedals?