DEAD EYE RIK RE-IGNITES LIONS TITLE CHALLENGE by Marcus Hook
Surrey Lions 297-6 (45 overs) v Gloucestershire Gladiators 231 (40 overs). Surrey Lions win by 66 runs.

After two consecutive defeats in the 45-over National Cricket League, Surrey's challenge for the Division One title was re-ignited last night with an emphatic 66-run victory over the leaders, Gloucestershire. The result sees the Lions and the Gladiators back level on points at the top of the table. Although Gloucestershire are ahead on run rate, Surrey have the advantage of a game in hand.

In front of a 7,500-strong crowd, a quality display in the field, led by Rikki Clarke, almost overshadowed superb innings of 84 and 83 from Alistair Brown and Mark Ramprakash. After Ian Ward miscued Jon Lewis to mid-off in the fifth over, Brown took just 61 balls over his highest score of the season in all competitions before Ramprakash set the tempo for what remained.

Having earlier won the toss the home side racked up 297 for six – their National League best against the west country outfit – thanks mainly to a 96-run second-wicket stand, which lasted fourteen overs and was dominated by Alistair Brown.

Brown struck three sixes, including two cracks straight down the ground in James Averis’s fifth over. But those who live by the sword invariably die by the sword and the 33-year-old, who had an escape at backward point when 18, was eventually caught at long-off upon the introduction of Martyn Ball.

The former England pair of Mark Ramprakash and Graham Thorpe then combined for 85 runs in fifty minutes. The summit of their third-wicket alliance was when Thorpe cut Averis off his stumps for a six over cover point. Later in the over Ramprakash could have been stumped for 64, but Jack Russell made no mistake when Graham Thorpe advanced on Shoaib Malik moments later.

Mark Ramprakash departed when his swish to leg failed to connect, leaving Rikki Clarke and Azhar Mahmood to engineer the final push. Clarke struck two sixes – one over extra cover off Shoaib and a second over mid-wicket off Alleyne – but neither could match the style with which Azhar pulled the Gladiators’ captain out of the ground of in the 42nd over.

Gloucestershire, who had won their previous six NCL outings, are not a team to be intimidated, however. Craig Spearman, the league’s leading run-maker was certainly not going to lie down. The former New Zealand batsman took 22 runs off Azhar Mahmood’s second over and added 70 in nine overs for the first wicket in partnership with Phil Weston.

However, the loss of Weston, caught at the wicket off Martin Bicknell for 25, and the introduction of Jimmy Ormond started to peg the visitors back. Ormond, who some observers are tipping to claim the place in the England side left vacant by Darren Gough’s announcement that he has retired from Test cricket, was the pick of the Lions’ attack.

Coincidence or not, the first three of five run outs came when the former Leicestershire seamer was applying pressure during a 37-run nine-over spell from the Vauxhall End. It did not seem possible that Sky Sports’ man of the match Rikki Clarke could better his throw which spelt the end of Alex Gidman, but two overs later he did. Swooping at backward point he ran out the dangerous Matt Windows before he could complete a risky single.

Graham Thorpe then got in on the act by running out Shoaib Malik from midwicket in the eighteenth over, by which time Spearman was fighting a losing battle. After making 85 off 73 balls he lapped a full toss from Clarke straight down square leg’s throat to spell the beginning of the end.

Nine overs later Tim Hancock was run out by a combination of Ramprakash and Batty. Mark Alleyne was yorked by Rikki Clarke in the next before the Gladiators’ last three wickets mustered only 23 runs in five overs. Two of them fell to the bowling of Clarke, who finished the night with his best figures of the season.

The only hitch for Surrey was the loss of Bicknell to a hamstring pull.

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