YORKSHIRE saved their crucial County Championship match against Nottinghamshire at Headingley yesterday.

Despite a nervous batting display for the first two sessions of the final day, Andrew Gale’s team can look back on a job well done as they have kept pace with the LV Division One’s new leaders.

Notts are now five points clear at the top, and have a game in hand on the Tykes.

Yorkshire have played 12 matches, Notts eleven.

“Although (the result) it’s disappointing, it’s certainly not the end of the world,” said director of professional cricket Martyn Moxon. “We live to fight another day.”

The rain forecast for the majority of the day only arrived at tea-time with the hosts perilously placed at 406- 8 after 153 overs of their second innings, only 39 runs ahead with two wickets and 34 overs remaining.

Jacques Rudolph’s 141 off 241 balls and Anthony Mc- Grath’s 80 off 263 were the innings of substance, although 37 from Gerard Brophy, 34 not out from Adil Rashid and 26 off 116 balls from nightwatchman Steve Patterson also proved crucial.

Yorkshire lost six wickets yesterday, McGrath, Gale, Patterson, Jonny Bairstow, Brophy and Ajmal Shahzad all falling.

Ryan Sidebottom and Darren Pattinson claimed three wickets apiece for the visitors.

Had rain not arrived during the tea break, Yorkshire would have faced a nervous last session of the match.

As it was, the four and a half sessions they batted proved to be sufficient to take five points out of the match instead of two. But it was the 13 points that Notts failed to get that are arguably the more important.

A 62-run partnership for the seventh wicket in 21 overs between Rashid and Brophy took Yorkshire into the lead.

The White Rose only scored one boundary during the morning - off the bat of Patterson.

The pace bowler spent just short of two and a half hours at the crease.

Moxon continued: “We obviously had a poor first two days, but credit to the lads for fighting back so manfully over the last two days. We got off to a bad start, and we didn’t recover for the next two days.

“We had a little bit of luck with the rain, but arguably we earned that with the effort we put in.

“We said after two days that it would be very unlikely that we were going to be able to win this, but we had to make sure that we didn’t lose it.”

Yorkshire now have four matches left. Moxon, who said that it would have been “very difficult” to win the title had they lost this match, added: “We will need to win at least two of those four, I think.”

Their next Championship match is against reigning champions Durham at the Riverside a week on Monday.

In the meantime, Group A leaders Yorkshire travel to Chesterfield tomorrow to face Derbyshire in the Clydesdale Bank 40 competition.

Scoreboard

Yorkshire v Nottinghamshire At Headingley Carnegie

Overnight: Nottinghamshire 545-7 dec (D J Hussey 251 no, S R Patel 96,P J Franks 61, M J Wood 59). Yorkshire 178 and 272-2 (J A Rudolph 141, AMcGrath 78 no).

Yorkshire Second Innings

A McGrath c Read b Pattinson .............80

S A Patterson c Wagh b S R Patel ........26

A W Gale c & b Sidebottom .................14

J M Bairstow b Pattinson ..................... 7

G L Brophy c Read b Sidebottom ........37

A U Rashid not out ...............................34

A Shahzad c Adams b Sidebottom ...... 3

Extras (b6 lb12 w1 nb8 pens 0)27

Total 8 wkts (153 overs)........406

Fall: 1-58 2-269 3-276 4-322 5-326 6-336 7- 398 8-406

Did Not Bat: D J Wainwright, O J Hannon- Dalby.

Total Bonus Pts: Yorkshire 2 Nottinghamshire 8

Bowling: Sidebottom 29-9-66-3. Pattinson 24-3-78-3. Franks 26-11-61-1. Adams 29-11- 68-0. S R Patel 41-6-104-1. Hussey 4-0-11- 0.

Yorkshire (5pts) drew with Nottinghamshire (11pts).