First day all square despite Petersen ton

On his last Championship appearance at the Oval in 2011, Alviro Petersen struck a sublime double century for Glamorgan, and it looked like the Somerset debutant would be on the way to another until a brilliant fight back from Surrey evened up events on day one of the County Championship match at the Oval.

While one South African opening batsman was grabbing all the headlines before the game, everybody seemed to forget that his Test Match opening partner was in the Somerset side today. However, by 18:00 this evening that had changed. His innings was a joy to watch for everyone but a Surrey fan, who are sick of seeing the sight of Peterson out in the middle at the Oval. His century came off of just 141 balls, and oozed class throughout, but a spell of 4-42 from Jade Dernbach inspired a Surrey comeback.

Marcus Trescothick won a vital toss and had no hesitations in electing to bat first, with good batting conditions predicted throughout the day. New captain Graeme Smith would have done the same, picking two spinners in Batty and Keedy, and therefore hoping to utilise them in the 4^th innings on a spinning wicket. But that wasn’t to be, with just the 2 frontline seamers in Dernbach and Meaker selected.

That meant Tremlett was left out, even though he was fit, which I thought was odd, but Jade proved his doubters wrong early on when he yorked England opener Nick Compton without scoring. The usually consistent Meaker struggled to find a line and length early on however, and the part time swing of de Bruyn was quickly turned to. The next wicket wasn’t too far away, as Batty had the Somerset captain trapped in front with a ball that straightened sharply.

James Hildreth and Petersen eased to lunch on 115-2, with no-one except Dernbach really troubling the batsman, and it was the South African born paceman who got the next wicket. Third ball after the break, Hildreth looked to cut him away, but could unfortunately (for Somerset) only drag the ball back onto his stumps. A lucky break for Dernbach, but you’ve got to take all the luck you can get.

However, as with the previous two wickets, a partnership started to form quite rapidly, especially after Dernbach’s accurate spell came to an end. Meaker was still struggling to hit his straps, which is a bad thing when you only have two seamers in your side, and you can never rely on de Bruyn for a wicket. Batty and Keedy weren’t getting much purchase out of the wicket, and Petersen eased to his century 40 minutes before tea, in which Somerset went into in command on 235-3.

After the tea break, batting still looked quite easy for the Somerset pair, but a rush of blood from Craig Kieswetter led to him being stumped off Batty. That was just the break we needed before the new ball was available, in which Dernbach utilised perfectly. Off the first delivery with the new cherry, Jade bowled Jos Buttler with a superb in-swinging delivery in which the England ‘keeper had shouldered arms, and followed that up by having Peter Trego caught by Solanki at slip for a golden duck.

The bowlers kept it tight for the next 50 minutes or so, and were rewarded when de Bruyn finally removed Petersen for a superb 167. Take his runs out of the equation, and it would be a far different story. We were really back into the game when Meaker eventually got one right to bowl Jamie Overton 5 balls later, with Somerset closing 15 minutes later on 340-8.

Overall, I think Smith and Co should be satisfied with the day’s proceedings, as they could have been far worse. I personally would have played Tremlett instead of Keedy, and I think that many would agree with my thoughts, especially as fears that one of the 2 seamers would have an off day came true in the case of Meaker.

Jade was by far the pick of the bowlers, and according to Mark Church (who has seen him more than most!) it was the best he had bowled in Championship cricket, which is good to see so early in the season. Meaker will come good, and that late wicket will give him confidence, and on a good looking pitch to bat on, 5 wickets in the final session is a great effort.

Tomorrow morning we must roll them over quickly, i.e. not let them get near 400, and set about getting our heads down and trying to gain a first innings lead.