Leicestershire reach 168/3 before rain brings an early finish at Cardiff

Glamorgan have enjoyed, by a country mile, the better of conditions in this contest so far. First, their bowlers exploited the damp conditions to dismiss Leicestershire in just 38 overs before yesterday, under sunshine and plenty of blue skies, their batsmen led by Jacques Rudolph and Chris Cooke, guided the Welsh county into a position of superiority and the luxury of four batting points with a first innings lead of 241 runs before declaring with half a dozen overs remaining Tom Helm then struck what may prove to be a decisive blow by removing Greg Smith who had come into this match at the top of Leicestershire's batting averages.


His departure left the rest of the East Midlands side facing a mountain to climb if they were to stave off defeat, and to compound the woes in the visiting camp, the overhead conditions looked like a return to bowler-friendly conditions, with early morning drizzle and a heavy cloud cover. But, as the local meteorologists had forecast, the showers moved away and the cloud base lifted allowing a prompt start at 11am with Michael Hogan and Tom Helm resuming the bowling to night-watchman Jigar Naik and Angus Robson.


The latter struck the first boundary of the day, clipping Helm's opening delivery to square-leg. Shortly afterwards, Naik top-edged a pull against Hogan to the ropes at long-leg before hoisting another ball to mid-wicket for three, but next over he inside-edged a ball from Helm onto his stumps as Leicestershire slipped to 27/2. Ned Eckersley duly joined Robson who drilled Helm off the front foot through the covers for four before the new batsman pulled Helm to deep mid-wicket as sunshine bathed the Stadium for the first time in the day.


Eckersley then cover drove Jim Allenby for four before Hogan switched to the Cathedral Road End and with the total on 51 he almost had Eckersley caught at second slip but Chris Cooke could not quite grasp onto the chance. Dean Cosker also nearly clung onto a diving catch as Robson skewed a drive against Allenby into the gully, with the Leicestershire batsman then celebrating his good fortune by cover driving Hogan for four.


Eckersley then greeted Will Owen by off-driving him to the ropes before Will Bragg and Dean Cosker bowled in tandem as the cloud cover increased. Robson cover drove Bragg before bisecting the keeper and first slip with another drive against the same bowler en route to an 85 ball fifty. He celebrated by striking three successive boundaries when Owen returned at the Cathedral Road End, the first to a deft cut, the second a drive through mid-off and the third through backward point as the third wicket pair continued to consolidate shortly before lunch.

Having reached 125/2 at lunch, Ned Eckersley brought up the century stand for the third wicket by cover driving Tom Helm before reaching his fifty by swatting Dean Cosker through the covers for four - his 67^th delivery. Three balls later he danced down the wicket to the left-arm spinner and deposited him into the River Stand for six as the deficit dropped below a hundred.


Generally though the pair played quite cautiously against the wily spinner, and when Eckersley next tried to hit Cosker over the top he perished at mid-off as Michael Hogan took a waist-high catch to end the stand which had added 129 in 35 overs. Ramnaresh Sarwan joined Robson with a massive bank of cloud building over the city skyline and he announced his arrival by square-cutting Cosker to the ropes.


Hogan also returned to the fray and beat the edge of Robson's bat on several occasions but in the 53^rd over rain started to fall and the players left the field with Leicestershire on 168/3.

An early tea was taken at 3.10pm and with the rain easing an inspection was planned for 4.15pm, but just as the umpires were heading out to have a look at the middle, the rains returned. There was a brief lull with an inspection planned at 5.20pm but the rain started to descend yet again as the groundstaff were starting to mop up. Play was called off with rain still falling at 5.50pm.