Despite a club record for the fourth wicket at Guildford, between centurions Alistair Brown and skipper Jonathan Batty, Surrey appear to be on course for their fourth championship defeat this season. Assuming Warwickshire clinch a well-fashioned victory today, they will claim their first championship double over the Oval outfit since 1968 and maintain their one hundred percent record against Surrey this summer.

After the hosts followed-on for the first time at Woodbridge Road since 1979 and made a poor start in so doing, Brown and Batty shared in a spirited 200-run alliance in 47 overs, thus beating Bernie Constable and Ron Tindall’s 162 against Sussex at Guildford in 1961. But just when it seemed that Surrey were about to win their first session of the match, they let Warwickshire back in by losing Alistair Brown and Azhar Mahmood in quick succession. Both were caught behind off the bowling of the promising Naqaash Tahir – Brown down the legside and Azhar dabbing at a ball that he really ought to have been leaving so close to the tea interval.

Brown’s innings of 103, which included a pulled six off Tahir and sixteen fours went a long way towards answering his critics, who doubted his ability to play a long innings. In the 36th over he despatched Alan Richardson through point for four to reach his half-century off 79 balls. The 34-year-old needed sixty more to post three-figures, which he achieved at the same time as raising the two-hundred partnership with a clip to the square leg boundary. But the applause had hardly died down when he was out to the very next ball.

Warwickshire looked as though they would wrap things up inside three days when Dougie Brown pinned Adam Hollioake on the crease in the third over after tea. However, Jonathan Batty found a new ally in Tim Murtagh, who, after a shaky start that included much playing and missing, made a mature 47 not out in 100 deliveries.

For five hours Batty led by example, his driving through extra cover a delight to watch. Having come in with his side in all sorts of trouble few would have expected him to still be there in the final over the day. Sadly, from a Surrey perspective, he will not be there when day three resumes, thanks to a full-length ball at pace from the pick of the visitors’ attack second time round, Dewald Pretorius.

Batty’s 145 in 257 deliveries, which included 22 boundaries, was his third century of the season – all of which have come when batting at five – and the first of his career at Guildford. He trudged off forlornly, but had no cause to be critical with himself for losing concentration so close to stumps. His attractive stand of 94 with Murtagh gives Surrey an outside chance of stealing victory from the jaws of defeat, but given that their lead is currently 157 it would take a wagging tail and an inspired performance in the field.

Earlier in the day, Surrey’s last pair added 24 runs to their first innings total before Nayan Doshi was caught at first slip trying to work the ball to leg. Insecurity personified, the number eleven at least had the distinction of taking more of the strike than nine out of the ten batsmen before him. The unbowed Ramprakash, meanwhile, was safe in the knowledge that he had played a chanceless innings of 145 in 320 minutes.

But following on 206 runs behind the home side were soon in trouble at 24 for three. Rikki Clarke lost his leg stump for the second time in the match, on this occasion via a glove as he attempted to lift the bat out of the way. Pretorius then captured the influential scalp of Mark Ramprakash, before tempting Scott Newman into playing another expansive cover drive to a ball that was angled across.

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