WHAT is known in cricket Press boxes as an SOTI brought an abrupt halt to Durham's encouraging progress against Hamphire at the Riverside yesterday.

They had reached 246 for four when lunchtime rain turned into a Storm Of Tropical Intensity, ending hopes that Jimmy Daley and Martin Speight could build on their fluent stand of 74.

With two days left, the only consolation for Durham is that there should be enough moisture around to help their four seamers when they begin the task of trying to dismiss their visitors twice.

First they will want at least two more batting points, which should not take up too much time if Speight continues in the vein which carried him to 36 not out.

Recalled in place of deposed captain Nick Speak after being left out for five games, he edged Peter Hartley through the slips on four before successfully taking on Shane Warne.

Daley's four fours in his 31 not out were all superbly-timed strokes, again underlining how a rich talent has failed to come to full fruition as he went into the match averaging 12.92 in the championship this season.

Durham feel that he is paralysed by a fear of failure and that he needs to get away from home to widen his experience, so they are insisting that he spends the winter in Australia. Other counties are said to be interested in him, but he has another year on his Durham contract.

Jon Lewis also played very positively yesterday as Durham attempted to make up for losing 64 overs on the first day. In the second over he pulled Dimitri Mascarenhas for two fours then edged him wide of the slips for a third.

He reached his fifth championship half-century of the season off 141 balls, but his stand of 125 with Simon Katich ended when the Australian tried to cut a ball from Mascarenhas which bounced more steeply than expected.

A top edge flew high to Warne at first slip and Katich was out for 60, still four short of 1,000 runs.

Hartley, the 40-year-old former Yorkshire stalwart, went past the bat often enough to suggest there is something there for the seamers and had Paul Collingwood taken at second slip for 12.

But whenever Hartley erred, he was put away, with Lewis hitting three more fours to reach 70 before he tried to cut Warne and got a bottom edge into his stumps, reducing Durham to a slightly perilous 172 for four.

Had another wicket gone quickly, Warne might have run through the tail, but Daley and Speight played him well.

If they continue their partnership it will be very difficult for Durham to drop either to accommodate the return of Nick Speak