-
23 minutes ago
Rothesay County Championship Division One, Cooper Associates County Ground, Taunton (day two)
Somerset 381-7: Aldridge 149*, Abell 118; Barker 2-35, Abbott 2-71
Hampshire: Yet to bat
Somerset 3pts, Hampshire 2pts
Centuries from Tom Abell and Kasey Aldridge helped Somerset recover from a perilous position on the second day against Hampshire at Taunton.
After the first day washout, the hosts slumped to 99-5, having won the toss, before Abell (118) and Aldridge (149no) put together a sixth-wicket stand of 221.
Keith Barker was the pick of relegation-threatened Hampshire’s bowling attack with 2-35 from 13 overs.
For Abell, it was a second Championship hundred in successive games, while 24-year-old Aldridge’s score was a career-best, beating the 101 not out he made against Lancashire at Old Trafford in 2023.
Together, they enabled the hosts to close on 381-7 in their first innings of the penultimate County Championship Division One fixture of the season.
After a slightly delayed start due to a shower, Somerset had reached 21 without loss in the fourth over when Tom Kohler-Cadmore, on 10, pulled a catch to square leg off Barker, who quickly followed up by having Tom Lammonby caught behind for a duck.
James Rew struck a six over fine leg off Barker before more rain interrupted play with Somerset 35-2. A further 10 overs were lost when the action resumed.
With only eight runs added Archie Vaughan edged a defensive push off Kyle Abbott through to wicketkeeper Ben Brown. It was 69-4 when Rew, on 30, dragged a delivery from James Fuller onto his stumps. The lunch score was 83-4 off 21 overs.
That became 99-5 when Lewis Goldsworthy, who had contributed 22 to a stand of 30 with Abell, was caught behind down the leg side by Brown to give off-spinner Washington Sundar a wicket.
That was as good as it got for Hampshire, Abell and Aldridge settling in to play some sweetly-timed strokes. Aldridge pulled a six off Fuller as the pair put together a half-century stand off 88 balls.
Abell moved to fifty with a firm clip off his legs for four off Eddie Jack, having faced 99 balls, and Aldridge, who is leaving at the end of the season to join Durham, followed to the same landmark off 76 deliveries. The century partnership was brought up off 143 balls and at tea Somerset had recovered to 208-5.
The final session saw Aldridge reverse sweep a six off Sundar, while a similar shot for four by Abell brought Somerset a first batting point and took the partnership past 150. A single off Fuller then took Abell to 96 and 1,000 first class runs for the season.
His 20th first-class hundred was reached with a boundary through mid-off, Fuller again the bowler, having faced 164 balls and hit 13 fours. It followed an innings of 130 in the previous Championship match against Yorkshire at Taunton.
When Aldridge played Sundar through the off side for two it took the stand to 190, a Somerset record for the sixth-wicket against Hampshire. Aldridge had also been involved in the previous highest, 188 with James Rew at Taunton in 2023, and he celebrated with a pulled six off Jack as the light closed in.
A single off Felix Organ took the all-rounder to his second first-class century off 155 balls, with 11 fours and three sixes.
He cleared the ropes for the fourth time with the cleanest of straight hits off Organ before the spinner responded by bowling Abell as he stretched forward.
His departure meant a second bowling point for Hampshire, who then lost spinner Nick Gubbins to injury two balls into his fourth over of the innings.
Aldridge slog-swept a fifth six off Sundar before Abbott bowled Ben Green in the first over with the second new ball. At stumps, Aldridge had faced 206 deliveries and extended his boundary count to 16 fours and five sixes.
Match report supplied by ECB Reporters’ Network, supported by Rothesay
