As lunch approaches:Somerset need 74 to beat Hampshire with four wickets remaining,Tom Abell, vitally, still there on 63,Big Craig, been and gone,Liam Dawson weaving magic,Lancashire, spearheaded by Keaton Jennings, 74 not out, are nearly there.

Need just 32 to beat Gloucestershire and, despite the best efforts of Will Williams, have five wickets left,At Edgbaston, Luc Benkenstein and Michael Pepper have a tricky rebuilding task, Essex need 131 against Warwickshire, with five wickets left,Robson and Holden continue in their merry way at Wantage Road,Both into the eighties, Middlesex sitting comfortably with a lead of 129 and barring disaster tootling towards a draw,Liam Dawson is finding spit and sawdust.

Abell edges through Brown’s legs who ends up sprawled as the ball flies to the rope.Useful runs as this task suddenly turns tricky for Somerset.And it is – for him.Bowled Dawson, four.Somerset six down, need 89.

Craig Overton wants to get this nonsense over with this morning.And another mid-morning wicket, this time from Southampton, where Somerset’s steady progress is interrupted.Hants hopping with happiness as Smeed reaches again and is caught at backward point by Jake Lehman.The quick Eddie Jack with the breakthrough.Somerset 188-5, need 99 to beat Hampshire.

A third wicket for Will Williams at Bristol, Matty Hurst chips and then flops over his bat in misery as the ball loops into the hands of Tommy Boorman,Lancs are now five wickets down, but KJ is still there, 60 not out,Fifty eight needed,​Essex are five down and staring at an afternoon on the coach home, discussing where it all went wrong over a bag of Quavers,Things appeared to have quietened down after that breakneck start but then Ed Barnard brought himself on, persuaded Tall Paul to drive down the ground, and the ball skewed off the toe-end of the bat to Keith Barker at mid-off.

Decent grab, too, stretching above his head,Will Smeed, yet to hit his red ball sweet spot, reaches outside off stump to drive Yusuf but no cigar,He and Tom Abell have, carefully, added 40 since Rew was out early this morning,Somerset need another 104 – and, with a couple of runs stroked into the off side, that’s the second time Abell has passed fifty this season,I pressed too soon, shortly afterwards Will Williams persuades Michael Jones to nibble to second slip for 30.

And then Jennings is caught off a no ball from Brookes.Lancs 126-4, need 76.Switch over to coverage of Lancs v Glos to hear Ed Seaborne say: “Lancashire are dictating the terms.”Good morning Tim Maitland!“A series of unhelpful suggestions, inaccurate advice and poor decision making led me, in my formative years, to attempt an education in geology where I learnt two important things: to ask yourself “what aren’t we seeing” and that I did not want to be a geologist.“The first of those has been nagging away at me in the early weeks of the County championship and I’ve finally found the answer: where are the pedal-to-the-metal, hard-sell-to-the-IPL, run-a-ball knocks this year?“On the absolute road produced at the Oval for Surrey’s game with Leicestershire, Ollie Pope’s progress towards his ton was, compared to the standards set at the height of Bazball, a Tavare-esque crawl (16 fours, no sixes at a strike rate of 76.

3), while I’m amazed that chants of “Are you Boycott in disguise” didn’t accompany the once-swashbuckling Jamie Smith’s tortoise-like progress to 166 (19 fours, 2 sixes at 69.17)...although to him it might have felt breathless after his 132 off 267 balls in the opening round at Edgbaston.

“It’s true that Nathan McSweeney went for it for Northants, but coming in at 472-2, I imagine he had carte blanche to do cartwheels as Luke Procter chugged along to his unbeaten 261 off 357 at Kent.Martin Anderson’s 228 for Derbyshire against the under-powered Worcestershire “pace” attack was impressive, but a strike rate of 84.13 is hardly T20-gone-mad, is it?“So, are we bereft of biff? Fresh out of thrash? (The lovely American wife suggested “lacking lickspittle” at this stage, but it’s my fault for not specifying that I was looking for words that hadn’t died out in the 1600s and she has been drinking) Are we cutting back on the carnage?“Statisticians would immediately argue that three weeks of the season is far too small a sample size to make any meaningful assessments: to them I say FAKE NEWS! We’re living in a Post-Truth world where lies are truth, white is black and peace is war.“By this stage last season Tom Abell had rattled off 371 runs at Taunton against (recurring theme) Worcestershire at 92.06.

Dan Lawrence had launched six sixes and 117 runs at 105.41 at Hove.John Simpson of Sussex had slashed five sixes and 110 runs at 94.02 at the same venue.Saif Zaib Zorroed (too much?) 105 runs at 116.

67 at Derby and Gloucestershire’s No.11 Marchant de Lange larrumped 51 from 27 at Canterbury.“The serious point to this facetious drivel is this: does this mean that the message about Bazball 2.0 has filtered down to the counties or, have they, like Ben Stokes in Australia this winter, just figured out for themselves that it is possible to back yourself too much?”Interesting point! It would be good to see if it still stands at the end of this seven-week block in mid-May.In Division Two, Lancashire have sped to 100, not a wicket fallen this morning.

They only need another 98 and Keaton Jennings has got his slippers on, 38 not out,And at Wantage Road, Max Holden and Sam Robson have extended Middlesex’s second-wicket partnership to 88 in a match that looks likely to end in handshakes at 5pm,A wicket at Southampton, and it’s the Rewmeister, prodding, awkwardly, outside his off stump and giving Ben Brown a catch just above the turf,Kyle Abbott the bowler,Somerset 158-4, need another 129 to beat Hants.

Baker and Abbott bowling nicely,Oh dear, Matt Critchley slaps a rank long hop to cover and Ethan Bamber is almost too embarrassed to celebrate,,,Essex 21 for four now, 185 more runs now their Everest.

Three in the over for Barker! Charlie Allison, bowled by one that may have kept a bit low.Essex 16 for three...​Early wickets in sunny Brumbados, Keith Barker striking first ball from the Pavilion End as Dean Elgar is trapped lbw offering no shot.

In comes Tall Paul to join Sam Cook, who spared him the hassle last night but has since squirted Barker’s third ball of the day to cover.That’s Barker’s 700th career wicket across formats.Essex 16 for two (need another 190) and an inauspicious start.They’ve started at sunny Southampton, where Sonny Baker is pistoning in and James Rew, hand on hip, is at the non-striker’s end, 58 not out.Somerset need another 148 to win, seven wickets in hand.

Largely lovely, with floating showers,I had a treat in the post on Friday, a copy of Jon Hotten’s new book Vinciness or The Unbearable Sadness of Batting,Now, Jon is a friend and I worked with him for quite a few years at The Nightwatchman so am very biased but I think he’s a lovely writer and I’ve read the first chapter and it is gorgeous,So I said I’d give it a plug – if you like Jon’s writing and are a Vince tragic, this is the book for you,Also here.

Adds Ali: “Warwickshire are currently warming up to Sultans of Swing by Dire Straits,,,will their day be the song title or the band name?”Very good,I once ended up watching two hours of Youtube videos on Sultans of Swing, I didn’t realise how obsessed people were with it.

Nicely set up here at Edgbaston: glorious sunshine (cold air), Essex needing 195 more runs to knock off 206, Warwickshire in the hunt for 10 wickets.So far the pitch has bucked a recent trend of being a bit lifeless - highest total in the match is 220 – so there should be chances created.But Warwickshire were badly burned last week trying – and failing – to defend 328 at Hove.James Rew held firm for Somerset once more to see his stock rise further and keep his side in the hunt for a final day victory on the south coast.After his first innings 86 the cherubic faced stroke maker was undefeated on 58 at the close of an intriguing day in Southampton.

Lewis Gregory bustled his way to a five wicket haul earlier in the piece as Nick Gubbins top scored with 83 in the home side’s second innings effort of 336.Hampshire’s Sonny Baker then had his dander well and truly up and the opposition in trouble by pocketing the Cidermen’s top three of Archie Vaughan, Tom Lammonby and Joshua Thomas, albeit the first two were guilty of being careless on the pull.Rew and Tom Abell then steadied the applecart to leave Somerset needing 148 more to pull off the win.Seventeen wickets fell at Edgbaston on a topsy turvy moving day where both sides seemingly had their bags packed at different stages.Essex will consider themselves to be in the stronger position heading into the final day with Dean Elgar and self-appointed nightwatchman Sam Cook seeing them to 11-0 at the close in pursuit of 206.

Warwickshire were bowled out for 220 inside 63 overs as visiting Captain Cook picked up five wickets including the crucial scalp of Beau Webster, the Aussie all-rounder’s 91 included sixteen boundaries and helped his side post a challenging if hardly fear-inducing target.In Division Two, centuries from Northamptonshire’s James Sales and Nathan McSweeney made Middlesex toil at Wantage Road as the home side made 409 in their first innings.Josh De Caires was pinned LBW by Luke Proctor early in Middlesex’s second innings but Sam Robson and Max Holden batted calmly to reach 109-1 and a lead of 41 runs by stumps.A pot boiler at Bristol saw James Bracey score a dogged century for Gloucestershire as they posted 305 against a toiling Lancashire.James Anderson and George Balderson took four wickets apiece to set up a tricksy fourth innings run chase.

Keaton Jennings shepherding the visitors to 75-3 at stumps, 127 more needed for victory.DIVISION ONESouthampton: Hampshire 238 and 336 v Somerset 288 & 139-3 – Somerset need 148 runs to winEdgbaston: Warwickshire 190 & 220 v Essex 205-9 & 11-0 – Essex need 195 runs to winDIVISION TWOBristol: Gloucestershire 136 and 305 v Lancashire 240 & 75-3 – Lancashire need 127 runs to winNorthampton: Northants 409 v Middlesex 341 & 109-1 – Middlesex lead by 41 runsHello! Hope it is as spring perfect wherever you are as it is in Manchester this morning, almondy bird cherry wafting me along on my dog walk.Thanks so much to Jim for covering yesterday, four games still in play and at least two results to watch over.Play starts at 11am, do join us.