Jake Libby was full of praise for the contributions of his teammates, as his Worcestershire outfit enjoyed another glorious day in the sunshine at Southampton.
After finishing overnight unbeaten after carving out a hard-fought century, Libby picked up where left off, batting through until he eventually declared at Tea, after a stunning career best first-class score of 228 that saw him spend over 10 hours in the middle.
Posting a whopping 677-7, an outstanding evening session saw Hampshire reduced to 68-3 in response, as the Pears finished the day in high spirits.
The stand-in Skipper, said given the conditions and the Kookaburra ball lacking movement, it was vital he and his side posted a healthy first-innings score after winning the toss.
“Pretty tired, to be honest! Two real hot days. But obviously the team is in a really good position. You know, I thought the way me and Hosey batted yesterday was really good. Obviously, to get three late wickets there is the cherry on top of a very nice cake.
“It’s a very good wicket. We haven’t been batting on such good surfaces this year, it is fair to say. So I think the fact that we got a nice, flat wicket to bat on, I just felt like I had to really cash in and go big.
“With the circumstances of the game and how it’s going to pan out. I think first inning scores were massive, and trying to go big was sort of the way forward.”
After early wickets fell in the morning session, Gareth Roderick entered the fray to join Libby, with his side 477-5.
Struggling for runs at the top of the order this season, the keeper-batter was shuffled down to the middle order, where he returned to form at just the right time for Worcestershire – as he scored a superb 80, in a stand worth 147.
Despite scoring a double-hundred himself, Libby, was full of praise for his batting partner.
“He actually batted really well, there was a little cluster of wickets there. His innings was key actually, to get us to a big total.
“We probably wouldn’t have got that many if it wasn’t for innings, he was really proactive against the spin as well and kept run rate moving. Just delighted for him to get a score, it was important for him and for the group.
“We had a conversation about the declaration, whether to keep going or not. I think ultimately, there’s a lot of first innings runs. I think our plan was always to go really big and Rodders provided the perfect momentum for that.”
After seeing over 650 first innings runs accumulated, a fast start with the ball was essential for the visitors – but not even Libby could have foreseen three-wickets falling in the final session.
Tom Taylor (2-16) and Adam Finch (1-12) both bowled with excellent discipline and consistency, to make run-scoring hard against all the odds.
The energy and hunger amongst the bowlers, was the most pleasing thing for Libby however, as he takes his side into Day Three in a dominant position.
“I’ll be honest, I thought they were excellent.
“We’ve got a long stint ahead of us, so we’ve put a marker down now to where the standard is. To get three poles tonight was massive for us. It just gives us confidence that there is wicket balls in that pitch.
“If we can do that over a long period of time and the balls keep coming, we’ve got one hell of a chance in this game.
“It was just starting to turn towards the back end of the day. We’re looking forward to seeing how the pitch does break up on day three and four.”
