Glamorgan meet Yorkshire in their penultimate contest in the Vitality County Championship with the contest at Sophia Gardens scheduled to get underway at 1030am on Tuesday 17 September. (writes Andrew Hignell)
Glamorgan’s defeat inside three days last week at Hove has seen them slip down to seventh place in the table whilst Yorkshire's comprehensive victory at Leicester by an innings and 72 runs has seen the White Roses move up into second place in the table, 21 points behind leaders Sussex. The four-wicket victory by Gloucestershire over Middlesex at Lord’s also means that Yorkshire now have a 15 point cushion ahead of the North London team who are now in third place.
Yorkshire will therefore be looking to further boost their promotion hopes at a ground where they have not been beaten in a Championship match since May 1987. The Glamorgan victory thirty-seven years ago at Sophia Gardens came during a rain-affected contest which saw Rodney Ontong claim 6/91 with his off-spin to bowl the Welsh county to a win by 73 runs.
This is one of three victories which the Welsh county have recorded at their Cardiff base against the Tykes with Glamorgan also winning in 1981 with Ontong to the fore again, this time with his seam bowling, as his team won by 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.
Glamorgan 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 following day, the third morning of the contest saw twenty wickets tumble as 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.
Yorkshire’s two most recent visits to Sophia Gardens – in 2021 and 2023 – have both ended in draws. They enjoyed the better of the game last summer, amassing 500 in their first innings with Shan Masood making hay in the September sunshine with 192 – his first century for the county – before a maiden five-wicket haul by Matthew Revis saw Glamorgan follow-on. However, Eddie Byrom and Sam Northeast oversaw a rearguard action to blunt Yorkshire’s hopes of victory with each batter scoring a hundred to see their side to the safety of a draw.
The game at Cardiff in 2021 had been billed by one national newspaper as “The battle to decide the Ashes: Root versus Labuschagne” with the contest also being broadcast live on Sky TV because of the cancellation of the Indian Premier League. The game 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 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.
A pair of fifties in last week’s Championship match against Sussex at Hove has taken Kiran’s personal tally to 881 first-class runs so he needs a further 119 to reach the coveted milestone of 1,000 first-class runs this season. Sam Northeast is also 76 runs away from reaching this personal landmark.