VICTORY in a game reduced to 34 overs per side after a storm-delayed start carried Middlesex to the top of the AXA table but the day was chiefly memorable for 70 in 52 balls by Michael Foster, an innings that included one of the biggest straight sixes seen at Lord's.

Foster arrived with Durham reduced to 55 for five in the 17th over and revived the innings in stands of 49 with Nick Speak and 47 in 4.5 overs with Nicky Phillips, whose contribution was five. In the 30th over, Foster found the first of his three fours, Durham's entire quota for the innings, before unleashing his mighty drive at slow left-armer Umer Rashid.

The carry, on to the roof of the Pavilion's South Turret, might conceivably have cleared the lot had it been marginally straighter and was almost certainly the best since Glamorgan's Mike Llewellyn lessened the impact of heavy defeat in the 1977 Gillette Cup final with a blow to roughly the same place. When, three balls from the end, the powerful Foster top-edged to the wicketkeeper, the ball gained even greater elevation. Alastair Fraser waited some seconds, it seemed, to celebrate best figures (four for 19) in any cricket for either Middlesex or Essex.

It has long been a Middlesex Sunday policy to trust in their spinners but Rashid, one of three included and known best for British Universities matches, would probably not have played his first county one-day match for two years had an alternative seamer been fit.

Langer went to the crease to start the reply with Middlesex needing 161 at 4.74 per over. Though two partners fell to Melvyn Betts' first 19 balls, a 47-run stand in 11 overs with Paul Weekes left a target of only 90 more at 5.35 midway through their overs.

Weekes miscued Foster's second ball to David Boon running back from midwicket and when Jason Pooley was run out by Betts and Langer, 46 in 62 balls, went lbw sweeping at Phillips, 53 more were wanted from the final nine overs.

David Nash and Richard Kettleborough, in his first one-day Middlesex match, allowed the asking rate to rise to 7.75 per over before taking 12 from the 31st and 10 from the next, apparently to secure the game.

But with the win a boundary away and seven balls remaining, Betts bowled Nash and his partner, seeking a bye off the last over's first ball, was run out to leave Jamie Hewitt to see them home with two deliveries to spare.