147/6. Yadav & Burgess (duck) both gone to Brooks. Looks bleak now......only Sam Hain showing any real class with his batting.

I don't think I've got an issue with Yates. He played poorly earlier this year, true, and he got dropped. He then played OK in the Royal London and we need an opener. This season as well as next. I'm fine with him staying there the rest of the season. Is Mousley at three in place of Davies going to add anything though? Never going to happen, I think Davies is there for the year now.

Highveld wrote:

Umpires can and do get dropped from the first class panel, also if they have poor gradings they won't be given high profile D1 and one day games.

So there are consequences for umpires.

Yates and Davies seem to be totally imune from the consequences of playing badly!

Sounds an odd one to say but I think our run rate has been really self defeating here. And not for the first time this season either.
We get a partnership or 2, but the set batsmen bat so slowly, that even though they’re in for some time, the score doesn’t progress enough to really effect the match.
Hain and Rhodes have been really bad at this, getting stuck in rebuild mode and being unable to speed up later on.

Lamb and Burgess have mitigated this often, but with one dropped and the other getting out early, they can’t.
You end up just keeping the other team in the match, like today, we’ve batted almost 20 overs more than them, but Somerset would always have felt in the match. Either a really poor tactic, or poor skills by the top order.

The first session tomorrow is going to be crucial. I don’t fancy chasing any more than 150 really.

The pitch has done plenty and it was obvious if you was out in the middle you needed to be scoring because eventually you are going to get one with your name on it! Sibley 5 in 35 balls set the tone, even at the end (and I know I will be criticised) but even OHD 2 from 28 balls stopped us getting what even now might be a critical point.

OHD was leaving all the scoring to Siraj who seemed to have more idea about how to do it, so I do not blame the tactics seeing as there were plenty of overs left to get a batting point. When I have seen him over the years, OHD has got out most of the time very early when trying to play attacking shots.

I appreciate what you say, and that was exactly what was happening, but given that one ball was always going to bring the curtain down, I personally bought it was the wrong call to expect all the runs to come at one end. It was disappointing to get so close!

Surely it is the job of the top order players to score the runs, not rely on OHD at 11?

The fact is that two of the top three have not contributed at an acceptable level all season.

Yates is averaging less than 12, excluding his one decent innings, less than 9 from 20 innings, so effectively meaning we are playing a man short when batting.
Likewise for Davies, he's played every game and excluding his best innings is averaging under 20, that is totally unacceptable for a specialist batsman.

Both may perform better in future, but their current performances mean they are not worth a place in the team, and their continued selection harms the overall performance of the team.

Well its in our own hands. Poor Somerset have now batted at 1030 three times in this match!

Somerset 51/2 with a lead of 74. Unless something dramatic happens, the best Warwickshire can hope for now is a draw. So slow now, 34 overs to score 53!

A draw suits both teams actually.

its only the third day

Game slowly getting away from us. Cannot say I would support us to chase any amount down now it has reached three figures.

This is going to be the best day to bat, despite the low scoring rate (which Rhodes & Briggs are taking care of) Somerset will find the runs as long as they keep wickets intact.

Tomorrow is a cloudier day and with our top 3 the middle order will soon be well up against it, this game is Somerset's to lose.

Somerset seem to be making sure they don't lose and at this rate might be batting into tomorrow.

With a lead around 300 overnight they could afford to declare. However, an hour's batting in the morning will make it safe for them with still a very good chance of bowling us out

I have to say that I am very surprised by Somerset's approach in the last couple of hours.

Even with our crab like approach to run rates they cannot declare on anything that would be even close to a total that is achievable, losing the game for them is unthinkable but they should already be at a point where they are thinking of putting us in 1st thing.

A lead of 286 is not enough to declare on (although we will never get that many) with what is at risk when a draw keeps them ahead of us but with wickets in hand they really should be 40 runs ahead of that total.

Bartlett looked horrific early on in his innings how on earth is he walking off with 91, I mean fair play but come on...

Don’t think a draw is awful for us. Draw here and beat Glos and I suspect that might be safety because Kent have got to play Hampshire and Somerset.
A loss could be terminal.

Because Somerset will still be ahead of us even with a draw, they will not give us a sniff so I would expect them to bat on to get a 350 lead or more as the thought of losing for them would be almost certain relegation. Just goes to show that all those people were right a few years ago that Somerset and their 'Make it turn from ball 1' pitches were their best way of trying to win the title. As soon as Leach became an England regular and Bess went to Yorkshire, they have struggled even though I know this is an away game for them.