Usman ton leaves Bears with a testing run chase
USMAN Khawaja’s debut century for Glamorgan against Warwickshire has set up a fascinating final day in their Specsavers County Championship match at Edgbaston.
Khawaja’s classy 125 (143 balls, 16 fours, one six) – his 23rd first-class century – lifted Glamorgan to 323 all out, setting the home side a victory target of 294.
Warwickshire closed the third day on 25 without loss – leaving both teams with everything to play for.
The home side have their sights set on a fourth successive championship win to reinforce their place at the top of Division Two while Glamorgan are scenting their first championship victory over Warwickshire since 1993.
This excellent match has ebbed and flowed throughout. On the third afternoon, Australian Test batsman Khawaja, on his first appearance for the Welsh county, and Chris Cooke, in his first as captain, added 115 to tilt the match their team’s way before Warwickshire hit back to take the last five wicket for 39 runs.
Glamorgan resumed on the third morning on 55 without loss and soon lost Nick Selman (42, 69 balls, six fours), who chipped Keith Barker to mid-wicket, and Connor Brown, who edged Chris Wright behind.
Jack Murphy dug in deep for 25 (80 balls, four fours) before he was yorked by Henry Brookes and the young seamer also ended the stubborn resistance of Owen Morgan (nine from 46 balls) when he won an lbw decision.
On a pitch offering the spinners less, rather than more, assistance as the match lengthens, Khawaja and Cooke applied themselves skilfully to add 115 in 28 overs. Uprooted before he could settle in the first innings, second time round Khawaja batted fluently for 205 minutes. He lifted Jeetan Patel for a straight six before falling lbw, trapped on the back foot, to the spinner.
Warwickshire struck twice with a new ball straight after tea when Cooke (59, 140 balls, seven fours) edged Brookes to wicketkeeper Tim Ambrose and David Lloyd fell lbw to Barker. Ruaidhri Smith clubbed four useful fours then edged Wright to Dominic Sibley at second slip.
Andrew Salter became the ninth Glamorgan wicket in the match to fall lbw when he missed a straight one from Patel before Lukas Carey edged Wright to Sibley.
That left Warwickshire with 13 overs to bat in the day and Will Rhodes and Sibley came through unscathed to lay a sound platform for the final-day chase.
Warwickshire bowler Wright said: “The wicket is possibly improving as the game goes along and that is reflected in the scores so, based on the way Sibbers and Rhodesy played in that last session, hopefully we can chase the target down.
“It’s not the sort of pitch where there are loads of jaffas, but it is quite attritional at times. It rewards patience with bat and ball so the hard part for us tomorrow will be the run-rate side of things. They bowled very well in the first innings so we’ll see how it goes but certainly it is a wicket that it is not easy to force the pace on.
“Looking at the game so far the three Test players have batted really well, Bell and Trott for us and Khawaja for them, and none of them looked like getting out.”