Three wickets each for Mark Footitt and Paul Franks have left Nottinghamshire in firm control of their first-class match with Oxford UCCE.

Resuming on 42-1, two early wickets from skipper Franks immediately put the students on the back foot, and wickets fell steadily throughout the day as the hosts were all out before tea.

Footitt finished with 3-58 and Franks 3-73, while Andy Carter picked up his maiden first-class wicket and Akhil Patel saw older brother Samit take the catch to give the left-arm chinaman bowler his first victim in Notts colours.

Notts then reached 104-3 at the close, a lead of 198, with Matt Wood, Alex Hales and Kevin O’Brien the men to fall.

Assistant manager Wayne Noon deliberately shook up the batting order to give those players who had failed in first innings a chance at the crease and said: “While we’ve bossed the game so far, the whole idea of the game is to have the batsmen making big scores.

“So far we’ve only seen Will Jefferson and Alex Hales pass 50 and in that respect things have been a bit disappointing.

“But on what is a very slow and flat wicket, there was very little assistance on offer to the bowlers. It was a case of our attack using their skills and being patient, and to bowl them out before tea was a good effort.

“The main objective is to win the game and we certainly won’t be batting after lunch. So tomorrow I’ll be looking for as many runs as possible in the morning session, and give ourselves 65 overs to bowl Oxford out.”