Rookie pace bowler Barry McCarthy bagged season’s best figures of four for 52 to blow away Kent’s top order and move Durham into the box seat at the mid-point of their Specsavers County Championship match in Canterbury.
Responding to Durham’s 448 all out – their best total of the four-day campaign to date – promotion-chasing Kent slid to 123 for eight only to be salvaged by Sam Northeast’s unbeaten 97 that took his side in at stumps on 211 for eight after 53 overs.
Northeast, the Kent skipper, combined with Yasir Shah (37*) to add an unbroken 88 through to the close, moving past Kent’s previous ninth-wicket record stand of 66 set by Min Patel and Mark Ealham at Tunbridge Wells in 2000 in the process. Yet the hosts still require another 88 runs on day three to be spared the humiliation of following on for the first time in 2017.
Having batted for more than four sessions, Durham set about taking six Kent wickets during a 90-minute purple patch that sent the hosts reeling in at tea on 72 for six. All six wickets fell to bowling from the Nackington Road end and it was 24-year-old McCarthy who made the early inroads.
Starting his side’s first-innings response at 2.34pm, Kent’s opening bat Sean Dickson (0) soon departed lbw, plum in front when working across the line against the Dubliner, then No3 Joe Denly under-edged an attempted pull through to the keeper.
England Lions batsman Daniel Bell-Drummond nicked into the cordon to give McCarthy 3-15 in his opening burst, after which the bustling Rushworth took over down the Nackington Road slope where he continued to give Kent the hurry-up.
Joe Weatherley (6) had his middle stump plucked out by a full delivery, Will Gidman (4) nicked to third slip, then Adam Rouse (8) followed in identical fashion, to another Ryan Pringle catch.
Kent’s demise continued after tea when Darren Stevens (14) aimed to late cut against Gavin Main only to pick out Graham Clark at backward point, then Matt Coles (2) steered one to slip to gift Rushworth a fourth wicket.
Northeast and Shah, on his Championship debut, then combined to bat out the 23 remaining overs of day two.
Durham, having resumed on their overnight score of 318 for five at the start of the day, battled hard to add a further 130 runs to their total and in order to bank four batting bonus points.
After cracking a brace of boundaries in the day’s first over from Coles, Paul Collingwood posted his 34th first-class century from 160 balls. In a moment of brevity, the 41-year-old made as if to walk down the pitch on a zimmer frame to shake hands with his sixth-wicket partner Stuart Poynter.
Kent snatched a second bowling point in the 110th over when Stevens pegged back Poynter’s off stump to break a stand worth 67 then, four deliveries later, Matthew Potts suffered a fourth-ball duck on county debut when he followed a Stevens away-swinger to nick to the keeper.
Stevens, now 41, then picked up his fifth, five-wicket return of the season by Collingwood’s 208-ball stay for 120. The Durham skipper, Stevens’ junior by only 26 days, followed an away swinger and edged to Coles at slip.
Stevens rested after a morning stint of 11-3-23-3, enabling Durham to add a vital 73 runs inside 20 overs either side of lunch through ninth-wicket pairing Rushworth and McCarthy (24).
McCarthy’s useful stay ended when Yasir Shah plucked out his off stump to become the Pakistan Test bowler’s first scalp in Championship cricket. Soon after, Rushworth’s 67-ball cameo of 57 ended when Bell-Drummond took a diving catch in the deep.
Coles finished with three for 118, but Kent were again indebted to veteran Stevens, who finished with five for 78 – his fifth, five-wicket return of the summer. However, Kent missed out on maximum bowling points for the first time this season.
Though Collingwood, the Durham skipper was disappointed to be dismissed by an older player in Stevens, he was delighted with his side’s position in the match.
“I’d like to think this proves that age is just a number. I was delighted to get my ton because I’ve enjoyed playing here down the years. Then, the partnership between Rushy and Benny got us up to a score we’re really pleased with and I’m happy for Chris who is really chuffed with a career-best 57.
“We needed to take wickets with the new ball and we managed that. Hopefully we can nip out their last two wickets tomorrow and force home our advantage. We needed a coupe of days like this and this performance could yet make the rest of our season.”
In explaining his ‘zimmer frame celebration’ upon reaching three figures, he added: “I just thought I’d have a bit of fun and pretend I’d got a zimmer frame out there. A lot of people go on about hindering you in sport, but I’m still enjoying the challenge of professional sport.”
“Stevo is a real canny bowler, not too much pace, but his accuracy is incredible and he has good skills. When you have a bowler who’ll hot the top of off stump five out of six deliveries he is likely to take wickets and that’s exactly what Stevo does.”
As for Stevens, he said: “We let ourselves down badly with the bat today. It’s a good pitch and there’s not really a lot going on. It was key to get through the new ball and we didn’t. It wasn’t a great shot of mine, the ball got a little stuck in the pitch, and instead of hitting it, I ended up just pushing it to the man at point.”
“Sam played brilliantly for us though and Yasir Shah too, his 37 was outstanding. Overall, they bowled well and we played some lapse shots. That’s maybe understandable as we’d just spent a day-and-a-half in the dirt fielding, but this is first-class cricket and if we want to play in the top tier we have to be better than what we were today.”