County Championship: Northants hit back against Glam in run feast

Glamorgan resumed on 367-6 with Tribe on 181, and the opener had to work hard for his runs against a testing spell from Luke Procter.

But Tribe’s key milestone of 200 came up with a clip to backward square leg off Justin Broad, marking the latest step in a rapid development for the talented 21 year old, who was not even in the Championship team at the start of the season.

Tribe added 83 for the seventh wicket with Timm van der Gugten before losing his off stump to a ball that kept low, while van der Gugten fell lbw to Calvin Harrison for 33 in the next over.

There was no immediate relief for the hosts as Crane (41 not out) and James Harris put on a further 50 before 17-year-old debutant spinner Nirvan Ramesh took the last two wickets.

Vasconcelos led a rapid reply after almost being run out by a dreadful call from Procter early on, with Glamorgan initially failing to take advantage of the vagaries of the pitch.

He reached his 50 off 66 balls, but clipped Zain Ul Hassan’s medium pace to Crane at mid-wicket immediately afterwards, with the score on 87.

Procter and Calvin Harrison kept the momentum up, but fell in successive overs from Crane, Harrison well caught by Colin Ingram at slip for 30 while Procter (67) turned one to Kiran Carlson at leg-slip.

Crane should have had James Sales caught on eight, but Ingram could not hold on to the slip chance, leaving the hosts to dominate the evening proceedings as Zaib and Sales kept the score rattling along in a stand of 107.

Glamorgan looked short of inspiration, one option down with spinner Ben Kellaway missing from the field, but Crane got a third when Sales came down the wicket and slapped the ball to mid-off for 35.

Zaib, coming into the match with an impressive total of 1,047 first-class runs for the season, continued to play fluently in the evening gloom under the lights.

But Justin Broad, with two innings of 150 plus behind him, was caught behind for 31 off the first ball of the final over with Crane striking again.