Energised Middlesex keep title glory in their sights

Middlesex 258 for 3 (Robson 77, Gubbins 69, Compton 56) v LancashireScorecard

These two teams cannot wait for next week. For Middlesex it should bring a title-deciding duel against Yorkshire at Lord’s; for Lancashire the hope is that it will bring merely safety from relegation, although that may only be achieved if Steven Croft’s team gain plenty of points from both the current game and their last match against Warwickshire at Edgbaston. They cannot depend on other’s failings.

In those two contrasting finales, one glorious, one rather modest, is told the multi-layered story of a season to which some cricketers are ready to bid farewell. The spectators at Old Trafford may talk fondly of summer’s lease having all too short a date; Croft’s players are looking back gratefully to the darling wins of May, without which they would be up the creek and paddleless. Perspective is all.

This diversity was reflected in the cricket on the first day of this game. After gritting it out against the new ball – only five runs were scored off the opening seven overs – Sam Robson and Nick Gubbins batted with increasing assurance and seemed resolved to make the most of Croft’s very surprising invitation to have first use of an Emirates Old Trafford wicket which did not play the batsmen false.

By lunch Middlesex’s openers had 93 runs on the board and had hit 14 fours, the majority of them through the covers when Lancashire’s seamers overpitched. Croft used five bowlers in the first 24 overs and it was not just the openers’ old-fashioned cable-knit sweaters that gave the morning’s cricket an air of one of those Ashes Tests in the 1990s when Australia racked up over 300 runs in a day, England wondered from where the next success was coming and every week brought a new investigation into the state of the summer game.

It …

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