Not a win, but a positive draw

In the end it did indeed peter out into a bore draw, the captains shook hands not long after 5pm with Middlesex only three down and with no hope of a result either way.

Without the star of Surrey's County Championship campaign, Steve Davies, there was a real chance that a Middlesex side containing Strauss, Shah, Finn and Udal could've run riot at the Oval. However a dead pitch and one Mark Ravin Ramprakash put paid to any designs Middlesex had on that sort of result. It was a resillient rather than rampant performance, but with more positives than negatives.

In different matches this year certain players have excelled, so if they could all excel in the same match, we'd have a chance of winning some games! Dernbach was excellent, Ramps is back in glorious touch, Meaker was good last time out and Tremlett has been impressive throughout. Nel needs to regain his knack of taking wickets before his place becomes vulnerable, if it isn't already.

My major gripe from this match is the pitch. The pitch for the Gloucestershire game, though we lost, was excellent - a good contest between bat and ball. This time though it was dead as a doornail, absolute rubbish. I do hope they heed the advice of a lot of fans and start producing more Gloucestershire-type wickets through the remainder of the season. We might lose more than we win to begin with, but we give ourselves a better chance of picking up maximum points by preparing more sporting pitches.