AFTER the Lord Mayor’s Show the first hour at Edgbaston yesterday seemed to set the stage for an end-ofseason pantomime.

The first hour after tea compounded the impression and it reached farcical proportions when the curtain fell because of the light. The floodlights were on but it was stated that “the artificial light had exceeded the natural light.” It was nowhere near as gloomy as at Lord’s on Saturday.

With 13 overs still due to be bowled, Warwickshire were 77 for one in reply to 201 and well on the way to avenging their Royal London Cup final defeat.

Durham followed that triumph with an early collapse before their blushes were spared by an unbeaten 63 from Ryan Pringle.

Gareth Breese also brought some sense to proceedings in what will definitely be his farewell appearance, but it vanished again after tea.

There was another case of back to reality as Chris Rushworth, fresh from his 15 wickets in half a day against Northamptonshire, saw four successive balls disappear to the boundary.

He posted two men on the leg-side boundary in the forlorn hope of persuading Varun Chopra to fall for a sucker punch. The opener pulled three fours then, when the next ball was pitched up, he on-drove it to the boundary.

Mark Wood posed the biggest threat to the Warwickshire openers, often beating the bat on his comeback from injury.

The scattering of fans dotted around the ground would have been entitled to ask why Keith Barker didn’t play for the Bears on Saturday, given the stranglehold he enjoys over Durham.

Starting in the day’s fifth over, after Durham chose to bat, he took three wickets in seven balls and added two more as they slumped to 78 for six.

Michael Richardson made 42 of those and he was replaced at the crease by Pringle, making only his second championship appearance.

The 22-year-old all-rounder from Sunderland experienced a fairly chastening first-class debut at Taunton in May, swiftly followed by a mauling from Lancashire’s Karl Brown in the second Twenty20 match.

Although he played in a few more T20 matches he didn’t take a wicket with his off-spin bowling and has performed better with bat than ball in the second X1.

He was in the squad at Lord’s, when the view was expressed that he would have learned from watching Warwickshire’s Jeetan Patel.

Such sentiments usually prove to be wishful thinking, considering that no benefit has been seen from the twohour “master class” Scott Borthwick enjoyed with Shane Warne this summer.

Pringle staked his claim for a regular place as a batsman, however, as he shared stands of 43 with Breese, 33 with Wood and 34 with Rushworth.

Most of the nine fours in the powerfully-built Pringle’s 84-ball 50 were firmly struck and the on-drive off Rikki Clarke which took him to 48 was a high-class stroke.

There were also drives through the off-side and firm clips to leg as the Hetton Lyons product capitalised on batting becoming easier as the ball grew older.

He filled the slot which would have been occupied by Phil Mustard, who has missed three of the last four championship games. He initially had a knee problem but it now seems he has been dropped.

Barker is not an extravagant swinger. He finds just enough to take the edge, with six of his victims falling that way in his eight-wicket match haul at Riverside two months ago. This time it was four out of five.

On a sunny morning there seemed to be no difficulties in the first four overs. After his three successive ducks, Keaton Jennings drove the third ball he faced to the cover boundary off Oliver Hannon-Dalby.

But with the score on 14 Mark Stoneman departed for eight when he shaped to drive Barker through mid-on and fell lbw.

The next two victims, Borthwick and Gordon Muchall, both pushed forward and edged the third ball they faced to the slips.

Given his record against the new ball, it was strange to see Muchall going in so early after batting at seven recently.

Paul Collingwood suffered the same fate, while Jennings was caught behind for ten off Hannon-Dalby.

Breese went to the crease at 43 for five in the 11th over and dug in while Richardson put away the occasional loose ball.

But shortly after lunch he played back and edged Barker to wicketkeeper Tim Ambrose.

The steep bounce of the 6ft 8in Boyd Rankin finally accounted for Breese after making 26 off 102 balls.

Wood and Rushworth made useful contributions and last man Varun Aaron was yorked by Rankin for two.

Given only three overs in his first spell, the Indian paceman returned to have Ian Westwood caught behind to end an opening stand of 76 just before play was abandoned.

Warwickshire v Durham
At Edgbaston.
Durham First Innings
M D Stoneman lbw b Barker............. 8
K K Jennings c Ambrose
b Hannon-Dalby ................................... 10
S G Borthwick c Clarke b Barker.... 0
G J Muchall c Chopra b Barker ....... 2
M Richardson c Ambrose b Barker. 42
P D Collingwood c Clarke b Barker 2
G R Breese c Clarke b Rankin......... 26
R D Pringle not out ............................. 63
M A Wood lbw b Clarke .................... 16
C Rushworth c & b Patel ................... 14
V R Aaron b Rankin ............................ 2
Extras (b9 lb5 nb2) ............ 16
Total (64.5 overs)..............201
Fall: 1-14 2-14 3-16 4-26 5-43 6-78
7-121 8-154 9-188
Bowling: Barker 17-1-59-5. Hannon-
Dalby 13-4-36-1. Clarke 13-2-33-1.
Rankin 12.5-2-41-2. Patel 9-3-18-1.
Warwickshire First Innings Close
V Chopra not out................................. 44
I Westwood c Richardson b Aaron . 30
W T Porterfield not out ...................... 1
Extras (lb2)..............................2
Total 1 wkt (18.3 overs)..... 77
Fall: 1-76
To Bat: I J L Trott, S R Hain, T R
Ambrose, R Clarke, K H D Barker, J S
Patel, O J Hannon-Dalby, W B Rankin.
Bowling: Rushworth 7-1-32-0. Aaron
4-1-11-1. Wood 5-0-26-0. Collingwood
2.3-0-6-0.