Frizzell County Championship Division One: July 26-29
Surrey 136 (Smith 3-33, Harris 3-55)
Notts 226 (Ealham 55)
Surrey 292-6 declared (Smith 3-57)
Notts 169-8 (Ealham 46, Alleyne 40)
Match drawn
The stand-in skipper saw us fail in a late run-chase for the second time this season, after our defeat to Hampshire in June, and has told the team they must go for the kill if they want to win the Championship title.
He said: ?If you?re going to win Division One you need to do better under that kind of pressure. We got ourselves into a position where we could win and then let Surrey back in.
?In the circumstances we?ve got to be happy with a draw. With six games left we?re top of the pile and now the first target for the rest of the season is not to lose any games. We?ve managed that in this case and again we are looking down on the rest of the table.
?I think we can now say we won?t be relegated and concentrate fully on a more glamorous target. There are probably three or four teams in with a shout of the title and with six games to go it?s great to be one of them.?
After our seam attack dismissed Surrey for their lowest total since the end of 2003, we had to knuckle down in conditions tailor-made for swing bowling but were still eight down by the end of day one.
But Mark Ealham, Graeme Swann and Greg Smith dug in to give us a valuable lead before rain wiped out a day and a half of play.
With the match apparently meandering to a draw, Surrey declared to set us a target of 203 to win off 40 overs. We looked in trouble at 43-4 but David Hussey, Alleyne and Ealham seemed to have pushed us to a winning position.
Surrey then took three wickets in five balls, only to be frustrated by Ryan Sidebottom and Smith who successfully saw off the last 40 balls to save the game.
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