County Championship: Ajaz Patel and Timm van der Gugten keep Glamorgan in chase against Derbyshire

  • By Nick Webb
  • BBC Sport Wales at Sophia Gardens

Image source, Huw Evans picture agency

Image caption, Glamorgan spinner Ajaz Patel's 5-68 in Derbyshire's first innings was his best for the county

LV= County Championship Division Two, Sophia Gardens Cardiff (day three)

Glamorgan 540-5 dec (96 overs): Lloyd 313*, Root 79; Dal 2-67

Derbyshire 253: Dal 92, Came 64, Reece 56; Patel 5-68, vd Gugten 3-37 & 123-3: Godleman 40

Derbyshire (2 pts) trail Glamorgan (8 pts) by 174 runs with seven second innings wickets standing

Glamorgan spinner Ajaz Patel claimed his first county five-for as they gave themselves a strong chance of beating Derbyshire and staying in the promotion race.

The visitors are 123-3 in their second innings, still 174 runs behind.

Patel (5-68) and seamer Timm van der Gugten (3-37) bowled superbly to dismiss Derbyshire for 253 in their first knock.

Anuj Dal (92) and Harry Came (64) resisted well before a collapse.

But with Middlesex poised for victory over Leicestershire, Glamorgan will need to better the north Londoners' result in the final round to stand a chance of overtaking them.

Derbyshire began the day on 135-5, effectively needing to survive the best part of two days to avoid defeat, but the sixth-wicket pair frustrated Glamorgan by battling stubbornly through the first session.

Came was particularly dogged before edging Van der Gugten to Patel at slip just after lunch to spark the collapse, with the Netherlands seamer trapping Dal lbw as he looked set for a century.

Glamorgan, hoping to stay in touch with second-placed Middlesex, wrapped up the innings quickly as New Zealand's Patel proved too skilful for the tail as five wickets crashed for 33 runs.

With the possibility of rain or bad light intervening, Glamorgan had to enforce the follow-on, with Michael Hogan leading them out in his last home game after 10 years' service.

Instead it was Hogan's opening bowling partner James Harris who had Luis Reece well caught behind for eight.

Van der Gugten charged in purposefully, trimming Brooke Guest's off-bail for nine, then having Billy Godleman palpably leg-before for 40.

But the experienced pair of Wayne Madsen (30 not out) and Leus du Plooy (36 not out) dropped anchor in the final hour with a stand of 57 to give Derbyshire some hope of final-day survival.

Glamorgan spinner Ajaz Patel told BBC Sport Wales:

"When you turn up as a spinner on a surface like that, offering a little bit, you expect to do a lot of work and I'm grateful I could take five today to get on the board, so it was enjoyable.

"It's about putting the ball in good areas and asking questions over a long period of time, I always think about bowling spin as a long-time thing and I try to build it up.

"It helps when you have 500 on the board, as a spinner you thrive on being able to work away, you can toss a few extra ones up.

"It's a game I think will go to the last session unless things happen drastically in the morning, one of those games we have to keep working, hopefully we can chalk up a win and a few more wickets in my column would be nice."

Derbyshire batter Harry Came told BBC Radio Derby:

"We enjoy batting together, me and Anuj, though he's a lot faster. We had to take each ball as it came and build a partnership five runs at a time.

"To have two crucial guys (Madsen and du Plooy) who've had great years, going into tomorrow, is really important for us, we've got to look to bat as long as we can.

"The pitch is tiring with plenty of spin and a bit of seam movement, it'll be a tough job but we'll look to get stuck in and hopefully get through.

"It would show a lot of character to get a draw from where we were, them putting on 550 and us losing four quick wickets, it would be a great result for us."