Glamorgan meet Yorkshire in their penultimate contest in the LV=Insurance County Championship with the contest at Sophia Gardens scheduled to get underway at 1030am on Sunday 10 September. (writes Andrew Hignell)
After their 80-run defeat at Worcester on Tuesday, Glamorgan have slipped to fourth place in the Division Two table and to remain in the hunt for promotion they need a full set of bonus points plus a victory over Yorkshire, besides hoping that the other games go in the Welsh county’s favour. The White Rose county arrive in Cardiff, still in eighth place in the table, having won their most recent game with Derbyshire by 277 runs at Scarborough.
The start of the game in 2021 between Glamorgan and Yorkshire at Cardiff began with a national newspaper proclaiming “The battle to decide the Ashes: Root v Labuschagne” with the contest at Sophia Gardens also being broadcast live on Sky TV because of the cancellation of the Indian Premier League. It proved to be a rain-affected draw but not before Joe Root had made 99 before chopping a rising ball from Dan Douthwaite onto his stumps. Nevertheless, his patient efforts, spanning almost five hours, helped the Tykes to secure a valuable first innings lead of 81 runs, before the pre-Ashes bragging rights took a further swing in Joe’s favour when Marnus Labuschagne departed for his first-ever Championship duck as he was bowled by Jordan Thompson. David Lloyd and Kiran Carlson then wiped off the arrears before the weather intervened and brought a premature finish.
This had been the White Roses first visit to the Cardiff ground for a Championship match since August 1998. In that game twenty-five years ago, Yorkshire had won by 114 runs after an outstanding all-round contribution by Gavin Hamilton, with the Scottish-born all-rounder posting scores of 79 and 70, besides returning match-figures of 10/112.
Glamorgan have beaten Yorkshire on three occasions at Sophia Gardens with their most recent victory coming in May 1987 when they were victorious in a rain-affected contest which saw Rodney Ontong, their all-rounder, claim 6/91 with his off-spin to bowl the Welsh county to a win by 73 runs. Six years before Ontong had been to the fore again, this time with his seam bowling, as Glamorgan won the contest at the Cardiff ground by the more emphatic margin of ten wickets. The South African-born cricketer claimed three wickets after John Hopkins had posted an imperious 116. Yorkshire duly followed-on before Ezra Moseley took 6/63 to leave Glamorgan needing just 44 to win.
The Welsh county also won in May 1973 which, like the three-day contest in 1987, was badly affected by rain. After a complete washout on the opening day and the loss of playing time the next day, the final day of the contest saw 20 wickets tumble as firstly Phil Carrick took 5/24 before Roger Davis bowled Glamorgan to victory with the off-spinner taking 5/12 as his team won by 65 runs.
Despite the defeat at New Road, there are still some important personal landmarks looming for Glamorgan’s players, including Kiran Carlson who topped to 900-mark in first-class cricket during the match against Worcestershire and needs a further 88 runs in the games against Yorkshire and Derbyshire to pass the landmark of a thousand runs in a season for the first time in his career.