Glamorgan complete their campaign in the LV=Insurance County Championship for 2021 with a visit to The Kia Oval to meet Surrey in a contest which is scheduled to start at 1030 on Tuesday, 21st September (writes Andrew Hignell).
This will be Glamorgan’s first Championship match at Surrey’s headquarters since April 2014 – a game which saw the Welsh county win by ten wickets after Surrey had started the final day 121 runs ahead. However, a dramatic morning session saw eight wickets tumble for 31 runs in the space of 15.2 action-packed overs as Graham Wagg and Michael Hogan scythed through some limp resistance with high quality swing and seam bowling. Needing 153 in a minimum of 78 overs, Gareth Rees and Will Bragg duly rubbed salt into Surrey’s wounds by safely guiding their side to the target shortly after the scheduled tea interval, with both batters completing assured half-centuries.
Their previous visit to The Oval in 2011 had seen the game end in a draw, despite Gareth Rees making 126. The opening batsman had also been in fine fettle in the match at The Oval during September 2009 when the Welsh county’s batters had a field day, amassing 702-8 declared – the second highest total in the Club’s history – as four of the visiting side completed centuries. Rees and Mark Cosgrove shared a scintillating opening stand of 315, before Jim Allenby and Mark Wallace each added hundreds themselves as they put Surrey’s attack to the sword with a record sixth wicket stand of 240.
Surrey’s most recent victory over Glamorgan in the County Championship at the Oval came in 2006 when they won by 218 runs – this has been one of 20 victories for the South London club in 55 matches in the competition at The Oval, with Glamorgan winning 8 and the remaining 27 ending in draws.
Despite the defeat in the Championship match against Gloucestershire at Sophia Gardens in the closing home fixture of the summer, there are still some personal landmarks looming for the Glamorgan players, especially Kiran Carlson whose tally of 859 first class runs during 2021 making him the seventh highest run-scorer in the County Championship and needing a further 141 runs to become the first Glamorgan batter since Marnus Labuschagne in July 2019 to score 1,000 runs in a season, as well as becoming the first homegrown player to reach this target since 2016 when both Aneurin Donald and Will Bragg reached 1,000 runs.