paceman josh tongue helped propel worcestershire into a position of strength with a five wicket haul on the second day of the specsavers county championship match against durham at New Road.
the home side had gained a first innings advantage of 117 after extending their overnight total from 321-6 to 390 all out and securing four batting points.
then the bowlers got to work including tongue who dismissed durham captain and australian batsman cameron bancroft for the second time in the game and then made inroads into the middle and lower order.
he finished with figures of 13-3-37-5 as durham were bowled out for 197 to leave worcestershire a victory target of 81 on the final day.
tongue’s efforts followed on from his six wickets in the opening championship win of the season against home side leicestershire.
club captain joe leach picked up another three wickets to finish with six in total in his comeback match from a stress fracture of the back.
when worcestershire resumed this morning, ross whiteley and ben cox completed their century partnership in 22 overs.
chris rushworth broke the stand when it was worth 101 by bowling whiteley who struck nine fours and two sixes in his 96-ball 72.
a fourth batting point was secured with four balls to spare when ed barnard edged ben raine to the boundary.
matt salisbury struck twice in the same over as cox (38) clipped the ball into the hands of matthew potts at mid wicket and leach (0) went for a pull shot and was bowled.
barnard (25) and last man tongue (20 not out) added 36 valuable runs before the former skied spinner liam trevaskis to backward square leg.
durham reached 7-0 in three overs before lunch but charlie morris broke through with the third ball after the resumption.
alex lees (2) was lbw to morris and then fellow opener cameron steel (17) was bowled by a leach delivery which cut back.
tongue picked up the prized wicket of durham skipper cameron bancroft (25) who dragged the ball onto his stumps.
cox then produced a superb legside stumping to account for gareth harte (25) standing up to barnard.
it was a top notch example of wicket-keeping at its best.
ned eckersley (12) looked to turn the ball to leg and was bowled by a tongue delivery which kept low.
the steady procession of wickets continued as jack burnham, who had top-scored with 76 in somerset’s first innings, pushed forward and edged tongue through to cox.
ben raine (23) helped trevaskis add 49 in 19 overs before he holed out to daryl mitchell at mid wicket off leach.
trevaskis fell three short of his half century when he was lbw to tongue who then yorked matt salisbury (0) with his next delivery.
leach finished off the innings when chris rushworth (2) nicked a delivery through to cox.
