By Christopher Martin-Jenkins at the Oval
Surrey (35-0) need 169 runs to bt Lancashire (203)
IT was a long wait but well worth it. Those who stayed until the 3.30 start saw a masterly innings by Michael Atherton, much brilliant Surrey ground fielding, some bowling spells of real quality too and a collapse by Lancashire which will probably prove to have cost them the game when the conflict has been concluded today. Surrey need 169 from a further 42 overs to earn a semi-final place.
Lancashire's slide became a full-blown career downhill when, in their final over, Saqlain Mushtaq became the 12th man to take a B & H hat-trick.
Four wickets for 21 runs in two overs - and eight wickets for 39 in 13 overs - may have been only a poor imitation of the Surrey collapse in the same competition on the same ground against the same opponents five seasons ago, when Surrey, needing 237 to win, went from 212 for one to 230 all out. But it was an extraordinary transformation from comfortable affluence to abject poverty nonetheless.
Lancashire, put in by Adam Hollioake, were 148 for one in the 32nd over on an ideal one-day pitch giving everyone a little help, with Atherton batting brilliantly and John Crawley just starting to do so when a bad bit of cricket by Crawley started the metamorphosis.
Whereas Atherton had looked in prime form from the outset, starting with a straight-driven four in Martin Bicknell's first over, clipping the ball off his legs with precision and running like a fit 20-year-old, his old school-mate had taken a long time to find the gaps.
Crawley had entered in the seventh over when Andrew Flintoff, having hit a massive drive over long off from several paces down the pitch, lifted the next ball with rather less conviction to mid-on, where Jason Ratcliffe held the first of three catches.
It took Crawley 21 overs to hit a four - a sweep off the only full toss bowled by Ian Salisbury - but he had made 44 of a partnership of 162 and was beginning to play with more freedom when Saqlain Mushtaq went round the wicket for the first time from the Vauxhall End.
It was time for an experienced Test cricketer to have a look for a ball or two. Instead he leapt down the wicket, tried to hit the ball over the MI6 building some 400 yards over mid-on's head, and missed. Still, no one could have guessed how suddenly the clouds would now blow up over Lancashire's serene sky.
Atherton, having reached his fifty off 59 balls, a typical big-match performance which the Test selectors will have noted and Adam Hollioake too if he is to lead England in the World Cup next year, pressed on to 93. He did so despite a good second spell by Joey Benjamin and even better ones by Bicknell and Salisbury.
Bicknell was in a minority of one in the 37th over when he apparently thought he had caught Atherton off his own bowling. There was not a shadow of doubt that he had dropped it to the ground in mid-juggle and it was a shame indeed that a third-umpire decision was required to prove it. Such incidents are becoming all too common. Two balls later, however, he got his man legitimately when Atherton aimed to leg at a straight ball. Neil Fairbrother, already missed behind the wicket by Alec Stewart from a bottom-edged cut, was run out by him instead when Graham Lloyd sent him back and Stewart's underarm throw hit the stumps.
In the same over Salisbury took Lloyd's outside edge with a sharp leg-break, though the stroke was limp, and only another run had been added when Wasim Akram swept cleanly but straight to deep square leg. A few good shots by Ian Austin were about all Lancashire had to show for their last 12 overs after that and worse came to worst when, in successive balls in the final over, Yates drove to long off, Austin to long on and Chapple, as if mesmerised, to shortish midwicket.
Left with what might have been a difficult eight overs in fading light, Stewart and Ali Brown played with customary elan. Wasim Akram thought he had got Brown caught behind in the last over before the eight o'clock deadline, but he will have to be at his sharpest and straightest if the holders are not to move to within one further match of a second successive final.
Day 2: Hollioake shoulders the burden
By Charles Randall at the Oval
Surrey (206-5) bt Lancashire (203) by 5 wkts
SURREY went through to their Benson and Hedges Cup semi-final tie at Leicester by defeating Lancashire with more than four overs to spare, but the holders gave themselves no reason for over-confidence.
Lancashire, terribly vulnerable after their weak batting the previous day, were allowed to claw their way back into the game with a four-wicket burst after Surrey had resumed their innings from an overnight score of 35 for no wicket.
Surrey can be infuriating in this mood of dissipation, though the presence of the Hollioake brothers at six and seven gives them batting depth unmatched by anyone, even Lancashire.
This was Lancashire's second one-day reverse in four days, having lost to Essex for their first AXA League defeat of the season, and it has been noticeable that Michael Atherton - with 98, 70 and Wednesday's 93 in his last three innings - and John Crawley have produced rich one-day form to cover vulnerability elsewhere, most notably Graham Lloyd's barren sequence.
Adam Hollioake looked in commanding form for Surrey, driving sixes off the medium-paced Ian Austin and Peter Martin with a wooden, exaggerated follow-through you would imagine to be the norm in Edwardian times. A C MacLaren would have admired him.
It will be surprising if public concern about Hollioake's shortage of victories as England's one-day captain affects him much, because he has broad shoulders and strong belief. A dismal Surrey day would shake him more, because expectations at their level, in relative terms, are higher than for England.
Hollioake arrived at the crease in the 30th over with a game that still needed winning, Surrey on the wobble at 113 for four. Glen Chapple, whose first five overs yesterday cost only six runs, and Martin bowled well and the pitch was taking spin for Gary Yates.
Fortunately for Surrey, Yates was no Saqlain Mushtaq, whose hat-trick on Wednesday did much to puff away the bloom of Lancashire's innings. Yates bowled tidily without quite creating the tension in the batsmen's minds as he might have done.
Yates bowled Alistair Brown with an off-break when the right-hander stepped away to offer a brash cut, out for 41 off 67 balls, and Graham Thorpe fine-edged a forward defence before he could cut loose.
Yates had Mark Butcher dropped by Wasim Akram at slip and that proved to be the last sniff of a Lancashire upset.
Two young women are among the seven cricketers selected to receive this summer's Brian Johnston Memorial Trust scholarship awards. They are Katherine Winks, 20, the vice-captain of the England under-21 side from Bath, and Ebony Rainford-Brent, 14, from Herne Hill in London. They receive up to UKP 500 each to help with travel, coaching and equipment costs.