DURHAM are up against it. After trailing by 104 on first innings they are 12 for one in the second, Will Smith the man out for one.

He shaped to drive an in-swinger from Keith Barker and got an inside edge into his stumps.

Already 32 behind, Durham needed to take Warwickshire’s remaining three wickets very quickly this morning, but they added a further 72 before they were all out for 267.

Rarely can a bower have endured such an hour of torment as Graham Onions as edges either dropped just short of the slips or flew wide of them.

He also beat the bat umpteen times and when last man Chris Wright skied him to mid-on the fielder trying to get under the ball was Ian Blackwell.

His back-pedalling always looked unlikely to succeed and although he got a hand to the ball the chance went down.

At least that wasn’t costly as Wright added only three more runs before Onions finally had him caught behind to end a very frustrating stand of 33 with Jeetan Patel.

The spinner, whose rustic approach won the match against Somerset last month, clobbered an unbeaten 30, including three fours in an over off Mitch Claydon.

Claydon took the first two wickets this morning, but he bowled a poor first over when Durham needed to follow the Ottis Gibson mantra of testing the batsman from the first ball.

In Claydon’s second over Barker cut him for three and Ian Bell for four. There was some mitigation in that the dampness meant sawdust was required and it was difficult to keep the ball dry. Not that it was going to swing anyway at 70 overs old in temperatures which required fielders’ hands to be thrust deep into pockets.

This was frowned upon when I wer’ a lad, but is now acceptable, although it increased the impression that after 30 minutes Durham’s spirits were flagging.

They finally realised that it was necessary to bowl short at Barker and showed their intentions by posting two men back for the miscued hook.

Barker still went for it, but the hook was so badly miscued that it went almost vertical for Phil Mustard to take the catch.

Warwickshire had added 25 at that point, and Bell put on 14 with Patel before Claydon produced a good one to have the England man caught behind for 120.

Wright looked very competent, although he favoured the leg side, while Patel continued to give himself room to thrash the ball through the off side.

Once the lead had reached 100 it was clear that Durham were going to have to bat very well to save the game – unless it rains again.