A catastrophic collapse from 157-3 to 189-8 during the afternoon session ensured that Sussex took the honours on the opening day of this very important County Championship match at Hove. After Mark Ramprakash had won the toss and elected to bat on a slow pitch under predominantly blue skies, Surrey lost both openers in James Kirtley's third over of the morning - Scott Newman for one to a highly dubious lbw verdict by Jeff Evans, and Richard Clinton for a duck to a fine low catch at third slip by Chris Adams. Evans then appeared to 'even the score' by rejecting an understandably confident leg-before shout against Rikki Clarke from the very next delivery - the final ball of Kirtley's lethal over - allowing the Surrey all-rounder to embark upon a solid third-wicket partnership with his skipper. This pair advanced the score from seven to ninety-five with some lovely strokeplay before Clarke fell for thirty-four shortly after Ramprakash had completed a splendid half-century. Having already posed a number of problems for Clarke, Mushtaq Ahmed outwitted and bowled the former England all-rounder with a much quicker delivery four overs before lunch.

Ramprakash and Jon Batty then saw off a post-lunch assault from Mushtaq, Kirtley and a slightly below-par Rana Naved-ul-Hasan, with the Surrey captain looking in particularly good form as he blasted the leg-spinner for a huge straight six onto a television gantry atop the Gilligan stand and then notched a second 'maximum' with a flat slog-sweep that caused diners to duck and dive for cover in a corporate hospitality box. The visitors were very much mistaken, however, if they thought everything would be plain sailing once Robin Martin-Jenkins and Luke Wright were paired in the attack. Martin-Jenkins started Surrey's slide by emulating Kirtley's early morning feat of claiming two scalps in an over, breaking the 62-run fourth-wicket stand by claiming Batty lbw with the first ball of his new spell and then winning another verdict from umpire David Shepherd against Ali Brown three balls later. The impressive, bustling Wright then produced a dramatic burst of three for six in eighteen balls to plunge Surrey into the mire at 189-8, first having Ramprakash caught at gully for ninety-seven from a firm square cut and then following up by having Tim Murtagh very well taken by Matt Prior diving away in front of first slip and sending Nayan Doshi's off stump cartwheeling. Azhar Mahmood was therefore left to try and shepherd his side through to a batting point and, thanks to Adams' strange reluctance to use Mushtaq against the tail-enders, he was actually able to take Surrey close to a second point with a fine counter-attacking fifty. Mohammad Akram offered unexpectedly solid support during a 48-run stand for the ninth wicket until the belated reappearance of Mushtaq predictably brought about his downfall. The manner of the dismissal was anything but predictable, however, as Akram reverse-hit his first ball from the little leg-spinner into the safe hands of Michael Yardy stationed on the cover point boundary. With the visitors just two runs short of a second point, 19-year-old Jade Dernbach - making his County Championship debut - became the fourth lbw victim of the innings, leaving Azhar high-and-dry on 57 and Mushtaq sharing Sussex's bowling honours with Wright, both men finishing with figures of 3-33.

Surrey's total looked to be below par on such a flat track and, with Akram seemingly out-of-sorts against his former team-mates, Richard Montgomerie and Carl Hopkinson - granted a rare outing in the County Championship owing to Ian Ward's groin injury - launched the hosts' reply with a steady opening stand of sixty-seven. Although Hopkinson fell lbw to Doshi during an impressive spell from the left-arm spinner, Montgomerie progressed to an impressive half-century by driving Dernbach's first ball in championship cricket to the cover boundary. Further fours from the third, fourth and fifth balls of the over meant that Dernbach's opening four-day over had been every bit as expensive as his first overs in totesport league and Twenty20 cricket had been; though he showed immense character to battle back and end the day with figures of 5-2-18-0. Further encouragement for Surrey came when Montgomerie was 'strangled' down the leg-side by Azhar after making sixty-eight but the visitors were undeniably struggling when stumps were drawn at 104-2.

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