Former Proteas star Ashwell Prince is blossoming once again under the Red Rose of Lancashire, producing a fighting innings of 97 which would be enough to secure victory against Derbyshire in the English county league.
He was on nine overnight, with his old mate Alviro Petersen (3), with three wickets down and a lead of 55. Petersen, who scored 115 in the first innings, added just six more runs and Lancashire were struggling at 43-4.
But Prince dug in and with Steve Croft added 160 in 42 overs for the fifth wicket. No one else was able to stay with him, and he was disappointingly caught behind, three shy of his 41st first-class hundred, off the bowling of young Tom Taylor, who at that stage had 6-38 off 13 overs.
Prince’s teammates will be grateful they convinced the old Warrior to change his mind about retiring when Lancashire were relegated to Div 2 last year.
‘As a player, you feel partly responsible for going down,’ he told the Manchester Evening News. ‘There’s still a bit of fight left in the old boy so I’d like to help the club get back to where they belong.’
He had again topped the county’s run-scoring list, having scored more than 4 000 runs since first representing them in 2009 and made his highest first-class score of 257 not out against Northamptonshire at Old Trafford in June. he played the last of his 66 Tests for South Africa in 2011 and went to England as a Kolpak player.
Lancashire were bowled out for 345 and at the close Derbys were 27-2, trailing by 338.
Another Warriors player, Colin Ingram, scored 56 as Glamorgan laboured their way to 419 in reply to Surrey’s 567-7 declared with a day to go in Cardiff.
He was on 14 when stumps were drawn on Monday night, and went on to his fifty in 100 balls, with eight fours. Jacques Rudolph, who earlier scored 69, will be pleased that Glamorgan did not roll over, fighting all the way down and forcing Surrey to bat again. It will take something special to get a result from this one.
In Nottingham, Vernon Philander toiled for scant reward as Yorkshire ploughed on to 441, a lead of 13 runs in the first innings.
At the close, Notts were 74-3, leading by just 61 runs.
