Royal London One-Day cup: Umesh Yadav wreaks havoc with five-fer against Durham

Veteran Indian pacer Umesh Yadav enjoyed a tremendous outing in Middlesex’s second group game of the Royal London One-Day Cup against Durham in Chester-le-Street on Sunday, 7th of August, grabbing a scintillating five-wicket haul.

Middlesex squared up against Durham in the second game of their campaign, following a damaging defeat against Leicestershire in their opening game of the season. Durham won the toss and elected to bat first in the match, following their embarrassing defeat against Surrey in the previous encounter.

Umesh Yadav, who had a solitary wicket to his name in the previous game, equalled that tally with only the second ball of the match after castling Durham’s opening batter Graham Clark. He scalped another wicket in his second over, dismissing the newly arrived skipper Scott Borthwick at the crease.

After accounting for three batters, the Indian pacer then returned to run through the tail, clean bowling Oliver Gibson for a duck following Chris Rushworth as he finished with incredible figures of 5/33 in 9.2 overs. Young leg-spinner Luke Hollman provided Middlesex with crucial breakthroughs in the middle overs as he fished with a four-for in his ten overs.

Michael Jones and Alex Lees take Durham to safety after Umesh Yadav’s early blitz

Durham were staring down the barrel after losing three quick wickets early in their innings, but Michael Jones and Alex Lees stitched up a vital 109-run stand for the fourth wicket to steady the ship for Durham. Lees was dismissed after a well-compiled half-century, but his partner Jones notched up a brilliant century to take their total to a respectable 268.

Middlesex, in their reply, are making a mockery of the chase, and by the time the scores are written, they are 132/0 in 20 overs. Middlesex skipper Stephen Eskinazi is leading from the front and is unbeaten on 65 of 63 deliveries, while his opening partner Mark Stoneman is complimenting his skipper really well with an unbeaten 62 off 60 deliveries. The writing seems to be on the wall for Durham as the batting side are cruising in pursuit of their below-par score.