Middlesex are Glamorgan’s next opponents at Sophia Gardens in the Rothesay County Championship, with the four-day contest at the Cardiff stadium starting at 1100am on Friday, 23 May (writes Andrew Hignell).
The two teams met earlier in the season at Lord’s where Middlesex won by nine wickets in a game which bore close comparison with Glamorgan’s recently completed match against Northants at Cardiff. In the contest at Lord’s, Glamorgan collapsed in their first innings from 108-1 to 199 before Middlesex replied with 470-9dec prior to bowling out Glamorgan for a second time. The victory over Northants at Sophia Gardens saw the visitors slump from 105-1 to 185 before the Welsh county responded with 424, prior to a fine bowling effort resulted in an eight-wicket victory inside three days.
Last weekend also saw Middlesex being defeated by leaders Leicestershire at Lord’s and are currently in fifth place in the Division Two table. In contrast, Glamorgan’s back-to-back victories over Kent and Northants has seen the Welsh county leapfrog up from the lower reaches of the table into third spot, 40 points behind Leicestershire and 10 behind Derbyshire who are in second spot after a gripping draw against Lancashire, ending eight wickets down and with their tail-enders defying Jimmy Anderson on his return to county cricket as the Red Roses pressed for their first victory of the summer but ultimately remained the only county in each division still without a success this summer.
Middlesex have won on their last three visits to Cardiff, in 2019, 2022 and 2024, although the outcome of last year’s contest at Sophia Gardens looked like going the way of the home team after Middlesex were chasing a target of 213 in 69 overs on the final afternoon. At first, they made serene progress, with Mark Stoneman posting his second fifty of the game before a dramatic passage of play saw seven wickets tumble for 59 runs as Mason Crane extracted lavish turn and bounce from the worn surface. James Harris also delivered a waspish spell with 52 runs still required by Middlesex when Jack Davies and Tom Helm joined forces. With the latter using his long reach to nullify Crane’s spin, the pair calmly chiselled away at the target before Helm on-drove Crane to seal victory with five overs remaining.
In April 2022 Middlesex won by an innings and 82 runs thanks to eight wickets from Toby Roland-Jones and an unbeaten 104 by John Simpson, whilst in 2019 Roland-Jones, who is now the captain of the Middlesex side, also claimed a nine-wicket match haul, with centuries by Dawid Malan and Sam Robson also helping to lay the foundations for their win by 256 runs.
It is thirty-four years since Glamorgan last recorded a Championship victory at their Cardiff base against Middlesex, with their victory during June 1991 coming during a rain-affected contest as four-wicket hauls by off-cutter Steve Barwick and seamer Mark Frost saw Glamorgan to a 129-run victory. This is the Welsh county’s sole Championship victory against Middlesex at Sophia Gardens after the move at the end of the 1966 season away from the Arms Park – a ground where Glamorgan also only recorded one victory in nine Championship matches against Middlesex, with their sole success coming in 1950 when they won by 86 runs with Allan Watkins making an unbeaten 98, whilst Don Shepherd, then a seam bowler, took 5/74.
Once again there are several personal milestones for Glamorgan players with Marnus Labuschagne needing 139 runs for 12,000 runs in all first-class cricket. Similarly, Sam Northeast needs a further 14 runs to reach the career landmark of 14,000 first-class runs, whilst Zain ul Hassan requires 59 to reach 1,000 runs in first-class cricket for Glamorgan.