Matthew Carter’s ten wickets on debut proved in vain as Somerset’s veterans completed an epic comeback
Andrew Miller at Taunton17-Jun-2015
ScorecardPeter Trego’s bristling innings helped take Somerset most of the way to victory•Getty Images
After summoning the spirit of the Wurzels in clouting Somerset to a monumental and, potentially, season-altering run-chase at Taunton, a croaky Peter Trego admitted afterwards that he had “blown his larynx” in a lusty dressing-room rendition of the team’s victory song.”I like to add a little bit of Wurzel to the Wurzels team song,” he said. “This is why we play the game and love pulling on the shirt. Win, lose or draw, we put heart and soul into each game, and days like this are worth all the bad days.”There have been a fair few bad days flying around the west country in recent weeks, but the euphoria that greeted Somerset’s achievement on the final day at Taunton was so heartfelt it was as if that eponymous blackbird himself had been been hunted down.The triumph was sealed with five minutes of the morning session remaining as Abdur Rehman launched a volley of three fours in four balls off the 19-year-old Nottinghamshire offspinner Matthew Carter, whose ten wickets on debut proved in vain as Somerset’s veterans completed an epic comeback.”To chase down 400 on a wicket that was assisting, that’s a massive feather in the cap of our batting line-up who have been having their rough times in the season,” Trego said. “But we are coming good and hopefully this will be the catalyst for a few more good results.”It wasn’t simply the size of the chase that astonished – Somerset had themselves been on the wrong end of a 400-plus chase when Middlesex beat them by five wickets at Taunton in April, so they knew that such a feat could be achieved at the County Ground.More remarkable still was their comeback from a first-innings deficit of 210, especially having shipped 300 runs in 71 overs on the first day, with Brendan Taylor’s 152 steering Nottinghamshire towards what ought to have been an unassailable position.”We showed great character to fight back from that deficit,” Trego said. “Our ageing attack bowling the team out for 190, and two ageing middle-order players putting on a hundred partnership. That’s one thing in this game you can’t replace: experience.”Needing a further 127 for victory, but having squandered a very solid start by losing four wickets for 46 in a nervy evening session on day three, Trego launched his day’s work as if he’d come out whistling his favourite refrain. “With a girt big stick I’ll knock ‘im down. Blackbird, I’ll ‘ave ee!”The blackbird in his sights from the outset was Carter, whose 7 for 56 in the first innings had done so much to put the skids under Somerset’s hopes in this contest. But Trego swung his big stick for two whistling cover drives from his first two balls of the day to set an emphatic and aggressive tone for his team.Alongside him in a critical sixth-wicket stand of 116 was Jim Allenby, who bided his time as his team-mate set the tempo by reaching his fifty from 63 balls. Allenby took half an hour to add four runs to his overnight 32, before stepping up his tempo with a whistling pull for four off Jake Ball.The pair had whittled the victory target down to a meagre 42 before the wobble that all of Somerset had expected and feared. Allenby was trapped lbw for 62 by Samit Patel, whose natural feistiness had been exacerbated by the rap on the knuckles he had received for a run-in with umpire Benson on the third afternoon.Tim Groenewald then survived an early chance as Ben Hilfenhaus spilled a skier, running in from third man, but Carter, the unlucky bowler, then claimed an even more vital scalp three runs later, as Trego pushed too firmly outside off once too often, and Steve Mullaney at slip set up an agonising finale, with 36 still needed and three wickets standing.Groenewald ground out a vital 13 before, with the requirement now whittled down to 20, he became Patel’s second lbw victim of the morning. At the other end was the Somerset debutant Michael Bates – one of the finest wicketkeepers in the country, no doubt, but a man who had been released by Hampshire for his failure to score enough runs.But Bates showed immense composure in what could hardly have been a more taxing audition, picking off the gaps in an oddly deep-set field to make 14 not out from 31 balls, then Rehman saw his opportunity for a sprint to the finish, with two back cuts for four through third man off Carter, before a hoick to leg and a punch of the air sealed the glory.Afterwards, Marcus Trescothick, Somerset’s captain, praised the composure of Trego and the tail in sealing a result that has earned them 20 precious points and enabled them to vault from rock bottom in the first division to the mid-table sanctuary of sixth. Suddenly it is Nottinghamshire, with one win from seven and home-and-away losses against Somerset to contemplate, who can’t help but have one anxious eye on that trapdoor.”It wasn’t just how many they got but the fashion they got them in,” he said. “It’s always good to be positive in this situation, when you are trying to bring down low totals. You need to score the runs quickly otherwise the pressure builds up and it plays a different part in the game.””Ow’s yer father?” the Wurzels might have added. “Alright!”