Foxes in total command after hitting nearly 600
HIGHEST HOME TOTAL SINCE 634 AGAINST DURHAM IN 2004
LV= Insurance County Championship, Division Two Uptonsteel County Ground, Leicester: Glamorgan 11-2 v Leicestershire (584 all out)
GLAMORGAN face an uphill battle to get even a draw after Leicestershire made their highest total on their home ground since 2004 on day two of their LV= Insurance County Championship match.
No Foxes side has prospered to the same degree since a Brad Hodge double century helped them pile on 634 against Durham 18 years ago.
Wiaan Mulder added only nine to his overnight 147 but Ben Mike’s 91 and a debut half-century from former Glamorgan bowler Roman Walker turned the screw before Callum Parkinson’s side were dismissed for 584, just a week after their recordbreaking 756 for four against Sussex in Hove.
A good pitch and a fast outfield meant Glamorgan’s bowlers had little margin for error, their mood not helped by some poor fielding that saw as many as seven catching chances go begging.
Off-spinner Andrew Salter’s four wickets cost 158 runs, albeit from 42 overs.
After losing both openers before they had reached double figures in their reply, Glamorgan had recovered to 111 for two when bad light brought an early close, with Sam Northeast on 50, but needing to reach 435 just to avoid the follow-on.
The day began with Leicestershire adding only a single to their overnight score before Harry Swindells was caught at second slip from a ball that climbed on him more than he expected, giving Michael Hogan a third wicket. The Mulder-Swindells partnership had added 138.
Leicestershire notched a fifth batting bonus point for only the second time this season as Mike arrived full of intent, the all-rounder hammering three fours in an over to end Hogan’s first spell of the day.
Michael Neser ended Mulder’s fine if not faultless innings moments after he had gone past 150 as the South African, perhaps weary from his exertions of the day before, was bowled between bat and pad.
The breakthrough gave Glamorgan an opportunity to stem the damage. In the event, Mike inflicted more, albeit with a few slices of luck before he was out for 91.
Spared on 43 after Hogan and Eddie Byrom left it to one another to take the catch when he top-edged James Harris, he survived a halfchance back to the bowler against Kiran Carlson’s off spin on 56 and was carelessly spilled by Harris himself at mid-on off Hogan on 70.
Mike regained his momentum after a period of circumspection, yet missed out on a maiden first-class century for the second time this season.
Left stranded on 99 not out when he ran out of partners against Middlesex at Lord’s in April, he moved into the 90s with four boundaries in as many overs here only to take one liberty too many with Salter, falling to a catch at long-on with the prize there for the taking.
The eighth wicket added 115, but Callum Parkinson was soon back in the pavilion as ninth man out after David Lloyd took a stunning catch at slip off Salter.
But there was time for Walker – making his first-class debut a year after moving to Grace Road from Glamorgan – to complete a 79-ball maiden fifty and benefit from another error in the field as Billy Root dropped him on 52 at deep midwicket, and for Chris Wright to survive a simple caught-and-bowled chance to Colin Ingram on 14 as the last wicket added another 45.
Lloyd, who survived beyond the first ball of Glamorgan’s reply only because Wright’s overstepping invalidated Louis Kimber’s brilliant catch at third slip, departed 18 balls later when Kimber reprised the moment to give Walker his maiden first-class wicket.
Byrom was taken low down at second slip off Wright but Ingram and Northeast played positively, adding 102 before play was called off with 12 overs left of the day’s schedule.
Debutant Walker said: “I’ll take a lot of confidence from how it has gone in this game.
“I batted at a time when the job had been done by the boys before me, so the only instructions were to bat as long as you can, keep scoring runs, keep rotating, and whatever we could get would be a bonus.
“To be given the new ball was a compliment. The ball was swinging all day and it would be good if conditions are similar tomorrow.”