ON A DAY when it seemed the only amusement would be in the packed seafront arcades, Durham's departing captain Mike Hussey hit the jackpot under Scarborough's blue evening skies yesterday.

In his final four-day game before leaving for the Australia A tour of Pakistan, Hussey passed 1,000 championship runs by reaching 85 out of Durham's 140 for one against Yorkshire.

After a foul morning a healthy gathering rolled in for the 4pm start of this promotion battle, but even the most supreme optimists among the Yorkshire contingent would have been hard-pressed to decipher division one potential in their attack.

For a 20-year-old, Tim Bresnan has had a heavy workload this season with the only sustained support coming from the South African, Deon Kruis.

With Chris Silverwood injured again, Yorkshire brought in the Scottish Northamptonshire reject, John Blain, for his first championship outing of the season and handed him the new ball.

It was all candy floss to Hussey as Blain delivered seven overs at little more than medium pace, which cost 41 runs, before making way for the much more impressive Bresnan.

A ripple of excitement went through the festival regulars who had been present since 11am when it was announced at 2.40 that play would begin at 4pm.

"Ah telled thee they'd start at fower," chirped one sage, while another added: "I said it'd be cracking t'flags by mid-afternoon."

The Scarborough club's chief executive, Cec Snell, decided after a convivial lunch that the gatemen could stand down and admission would be free. "It's good PR," he said. "They'll come back tomorrow as well."

He also knew that the delayed start meant that, barring some calamitous batting, the match will go into a fourth day, which has not often been the case in recent seasons.

It hardly bodes well for Yorkshire's prospects as a division one force that they have to fall back on Blain and wicketkeeper Simon Guy, who was deemed a failure last season.

Kruis bowled a decent spell, having Gary Scott caught by Guy, before being replaced by Ian Harvey, who returned after injury at the expense of Michael Lumb.

Yorkshire might reflect that if only skipper Craig White considered himself fit to bowl they could have retained Lumb as a just reward for his recent improved form.

Opening up with Blain on a pitch offering good pace and bounce merely hastened Hussey out of the blocks as he was able to demonstrate his pulling power to anyone not already aware of it.

The sight of a deep mid-wicket being posted in the first hour of a championship game was tantamount to an admission that Yorkshire will be happy with a draw. As they were content to leak runs in the fashionably vacant third man area they would argue that deep mid-wicket was there for the catch, but Hussey wasn't born yesterday and the only semblance of a chance was an edge off Kruis which flew wide of third slip.

Paul Collingwood survived a sharp chance, also off Kruis, to Phil Jaques at first slip on his way to 33 not out and he will also have his sights on 1,000 runs today as he needs a further 66.

With the first day of promotion rivals Essex's match against Somerset being washed out at Colchester, it could well be that a Scarborough stalemate will suit both sides here.

Hussey does not think in such terms, however. He has a magic touch with the coin as well as the bat and won the toss for the seventh time in the last eight games.

Scott, recalled after injury while Neil Killeen also came in, was off the mark by steering Kruis over gully in the first over.

But he managed only one more boundary before he departed with the total on 56 in the 15th over, edging a good out-swinger from Kruis.

Harvey looked rusty and it was a further sign of the threadbare nature of Yorkshire's attack that they had Anthony McGrath on in the 30th over. He opened up with four maidens, but his swingers were too gentle to trouble two batsmen in prime form, who will hope to fill their boots today.