An unbeaten fourth wicket partnership of 214 from Surrey’s captain and vice-captain put the home side very much in the ascendancy at the end of the first day of their match against Kent at the Brit Oval. Mark Ramprakash was joined by Jonathan Batty in the 31st over with 92 runs on the board and Shahid, Newman and Clarke back in the dressing room. But together they saw their side out of a spot of bother and well on the way to an impressive first innings total.

The Surrey skipper raised a few eyebrows by putting himself ahead of Alistair Brown in the batting order. However, by the close, which was hastened by failing light, the 30-year-old wicketkeeper had all but overtaken his illustrious partner.

Ramprakash had reached his fifth first-class hundred against Kent, and 68th in all, in 185 deliveries with his 15th four, which the former Middlesex man sent fizzing straight down the ground off Saggers. His knock also included one six, which came in the previous over off the hapless Ferley, who never found his line and conceded a total of 75 runs off fourteen overs.

Batty, who also passed 3,000 championship career runs, took 82 balls reaching thirty-one. He needed just 103 more to go to his seventh first-class hundred and his first this summer, which was realised with a classical on-drive off the bowling of Amjad Khan. Unlike his partner’s, Jonathan Batty’s century had not been chanceless. With 87 to his name and the scoreboard showing 246-3, he was dropped by former team-mate Michael Carberry on the deep point boundary off the bowling of Sami.

The fourth wicket pair kept one another company for 54 overs in all and appear this morning to be on course to overhaul Surrey’s record for this fixture – the 250 set by T.H.Clark and R.C.E.Pratt at The Oval in 1953. The hundred partnership took them 29 overs, but just eight more were needed to pass the 150-mark as Batty went on the rampage, displaying only a modicum of respect for what Khan and Ferley had to serve up.

Earlier, after winning the toss and electing to bat, the Oval outfit had to negotiate impressive opening spells from Kent’s leading bowlers in the championship this season, Mohammad Sami and Martin Saggers. The first ten overs saw seven maidens as well as the departure of Shahid, caught by the finer of two gullies, and Newman, who was adjudged leg before to a ball that appeared to be doing a bit too much.

The first boundary of the morning did not arrive until the twelfth over. But just like number 36 buses, you wait for ages and then three come along together. They were all off the blade of Ramprakash. The first was a prod to third man, but there was no uncertainty about the next two, which were wristily despatched to the rope at backward square leg. Saggers’s figures were still an acceptable 6-4-13-1 following the assault. Not to be outdone Sami soon had 7-2-12-1 to his name.

Forced to make a tentative start Clarke was dropped on 20, when Khan floored a well struck caught and bowled chance. Ten overs later, however, the England one-day player was out to a wonderful catch at second slip, following his attempt to cover drive Saggers on one leg.

Twenty-one-year-old Matt Dennington was unlucky not to have been rewarded in his opening spell in championship cricket, but was less impressive when he returned in the 46th over to do battle with Ramprakash and Batty, who, by then, had booked themselves in for breakfast.

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