County Championship: Essex bowlers fight back against Durham

Ben McKinney played with textbook orthodoxy and mature assurance in helping Durham to frustrate Essex for much of a sun-kissed day at Chelmsford with the second first-class century of his burgeoning career.

The 20-year-old left-hander, so strong in the V between mid-on and mid-off where a large proportion of his 18 fours and two sixes were caressed, faced 228 balls in compiling an elegant 121 to help Durham to 316-8 at stumps in the battle to avoid relegation from Division One of the County Championship against their fellow candidates.

McKinney was joined by captain Alex Lees, who made 94 from 152 balls, in a 134-run second-wicket partnership that looked to have laid firm foundations for a commanding score on a lifeless Chelmsford pitch.

But a new-ball burst from Jamie Porter saw three wickets fall in five balls, starting with McKinney’s departure, in the middle of an evening collapse in which Durham crashed from 240-3 to 291-8 in 22 overs. Porter finished the day with 3-63, backed up by New Zealander Doug Bracewell, who took 2-67 at the start of his second spell with Essex.

Durham’s decision to bat on the green-tinged wicket was justified for a large part of day one. Apart from a bit of nip and spite in the first couple of overs, it became a batsmen’s paradise and Lees and McKinney in particular took full advantage in laying down a solid platform.

Lees lost opening partner Emilio Gay with 55 on the board. Lees had just welcomed Bracewell back to Chelmsford for his second stint by taking 13 from his first five balls. But with delivery No6 Bracewell had Gay flicking the ball off his legs into midwicket’s hands. It was redemption of a kind for Bracewell, who had dropped a regulation chance early on that reprieved Gay in the same spot where the wicket fell.

Lees adopted the anchor role initially as McKinney contributed 35 of the partnership’s first fifty, but only 20 of the second. Though McKinney was outwardly the more aggressive, with two notable firmly-struck straight drives for four off Bracewell and Simon Harmer, it was Lees who clocked marginally the quicker half-century.

Lees reached the milestone when he drove Noah Thain for his eighth boundary from 75 balls. McKinney needed three more balls to pass his fifty for only the second time this season, though he did it with his 11th four, a well-placed drive off Porter through mid-off.

The partnership was finally broken when Lees played down the wrong line to Harmer and was lbw. David Bedingham followed almost instantly, run out to a throw from mid-off by Porter as he looked to get off the mark first ball. McKinney, at the other end, recognised there was no possibility of a run and barely moved a muscle.

Harmer thought he had McKinney on 83 with a sharp caught-and-bowled low down, even throwing the ball to the umpire as he celebrated presumptuously with team-mates. However, the umpires conferred and confirmed the ball had not carried. To rub salt in the wound, McKinney reached three-figures from 156 balls with a four and a six from successive balls off Harmer, both crossing the long-off boundary.

Shane Snater switched ends for the first over after tea and induced Colin Ackermann into an inside edge to the fifth ball to be caught behind. And when Bracewell replaced Snater he had Ollie Robinson strangled down the legside with his third ball.

Essex took the second new-ball after 80 overs and required a third one immediately: the original one lasted just two deliveries after Graham Clark pulled Porter’s loosener over square leg for six and knocked it out of shape.

The change of balls finally paid dividends as Porter struck in short order, ending McKinney’s stay by bowling him, then having Ben Raine trapped lbw before disturbing Matthew Potts’s stumps.

Report supplied by ECB Reporters’ Network, supported by Rothesay