County Championship: Liam Patterson-White helps Nottinghamshire dominate Essex

Rothesay County Championship, Division One, Ambassador Cruise Line Ground, Chelmsford (day one)

Essex 184: Westley 44; Patterson-White 6-43

Nottinghamshire 111-2: Hameed 68*; Snater 2-29

Notts (3 pts) trail Essex (0 pts) by 73 runs

Match scorecard

Liam Patterson-White prevented Nottinghamshire suffering a lingering hangover from their Taunton mauling by claiming career-best bowling figures to run through some fragile Essex batting at Chelmsford.

The reigning County Championship champions tasted their first defeat of the season against Somerset last week, routed by 306 runs, but Patterson-White initiated Essex’s collapse from 87-2 just before lunch and added five of the afternoon’s seven wickets to finish with 6-43.

The 27-year-old spinner’s figures might have been even more impressive had Shane Snater not hit him for three sixes down the ground in some late resistance as Essex staggered to 184 all out at tea. Captain Tom Westley’s passive-aggressive approach, reaching 44 from 66 balls, was not replicated by his team-mates.

In contrast to the Essex effort, Haseeb Hameed, Westley’s Nottinghamshire counterpart, was in an ominous mood.

By the close, the former England opener, who has struggled for runs so far, had weighed in with an unbeaten 68 out of Nottinghamshire’s 111-2 in reply, just 73 runs behind.

If Essex had hoped to make hay in the sun on a sandy-hued wicket with some grass left on it, the early portents proved accurate. It took the openers until the fifth over to put a run on the board and they only had 31 inside 13 overs by which time they had lost two wickets.

Dean Elgar fell lbw playing all around a ball from Brett Hutton that did not get up for his 11th sub-20 total in 14 innings this season. Paul Walter followed, edging Olly Stone and was already exiting before the ball hit the wicketkeeper’s gloves.

Tom Westley, though, showed precisely why he had chosen to bat after winning the toss. He was off the mark first ball with a boundary to third man and struck seven more, two gloriously straight and another through the covers before becoming Patterson-White’s first wicket on the cusp of lunch.

He had dominated Essex’s largest stand of 56 in 17 overs with Charlie Allison, who contributed just 13. However, in thrusting his front leg to the pitch of a delivery, Westley sent a leading edge to a diving slip.

It sparked an avalanche of wickets on the other side of the interval. Allison hesitated at the non-striker’s end when Matt Critchley’s prod squeezed past the infield to Hameed at point. His return to the wicketkeeper beat Allison’s belated dash. Five balls later, Critchley was lbw to one from Fergus O’Neill that kept low.

Michael Pepper had endured a lacklustre red-ball summer with the bat, but decided attack was the best way to revive both his and Essex’s fortunes. Two flashing drives through the covers in an over from O’Neill, and two forceful sweeps off Patterson-White set the tone for his cameo innings. But the spinner had his revenge when Pepper jammed down on a delivery that popped up to second slip.

Patterson-White then accounted for the final five wickers. Simon Harmer failed to get to the pitch of the ball and lost off-stump; Luc Benkenstein was caught behind from one that followed him; and, after a flourish by Snater and Charlie Bennett, putting on 44 for the ninth wicket, Bennett perished in the slips and Snater was bowled going for a fourth maximum.

After that exhibition of spin bowling, it was no surprise that Harmer was into the Essex attack after just seven overs, though without the same result.

By the time of his arrival, Ben Slater was back in the pavilion, thick-edging Snater to the wicketkeeper. Thirteen overs later, and having switched ends, Snater had a second, beating the outside of Freddie McCann’s bat and bowling him.

Report by ECB Reporters’ Network, supported by Rothesay.