Durham posted their highest innings total at home in 2012 in their bid to claim victory over Surrey and had the visitors five wickets down, still trailing by 112
Dale Benkenstein and Paul Collingwood batted superbly in the morning session with their 132 run partnership ending just before lunch when Benkenstein, who passed fifty for the first time in foru day cricket this season, was bowled by Jade Dernbach on 69.
The captain’s innings was brought to an end when Steven Davies held onto a catch, off Dernbach, with Collingwood dismissed for 78.
Tim Linley claimed the second of his wickets of the innings with Scott Borthwick caught by Rory Burns for 1.
Phil Mustard and Callum Thorp’s 72 run partnership guided Durham past the 300 mark to pick up their third batting point. Mustard, who was initially given out lbw on 43 but called back by the umpire after consultation confirmed there had been an inside edge, added three to his total before going for real, with Jon Lewis picking up the wicket.
Thorp was caught by Gareth Batty in Lewis’ following over and Zander de Bruyn claimed the final scalp when Graham Onions was caught by Linley leaving Rushworth unbeaten on 3.
Durham ended their first innings with 310 on the board, having established a lead of 181.
Onions struck first, breaking Surrey’s opening partnership when Zafar Ansari (6) edged to Collingwood in the slips with Surrey 17-1.
A change at the Finchale End brought about an immediate result in the 15th over with Ben Stokes striking third ball, trapping Harinath lbw for 5.
Surrey were 47-3 when De Bruyn (10) was run out by a direct hit from Dale Benkenstein at mid on.
Stokes had Jason Roy trapped lbw for just 1 and Chris Rushworth claimed the fifth wicket of the session when Davies was caught behind on 15.
By the close of play Surrey were 69-5 trailing by 112.
Following the action captain Paul Collingwood said, “Most of the games this year have been very, very close, we’ve got a good lead from the first innings but we still have to turn up tomorrow, finish the job off and keep those standards high.
“Getting the partnership going with Dale felt good, we were in a little bit of trouble and once we got going I think it did take a couple of old heads to take the pressure off and really dig into a long hard slog of facing some balls and scoring some runs. I was delighted that we could do that for the team.
“It was as important partnership there at the end between Phil Mustard and Callum Thorp, you can never have too many runs and I was impressed how all the lads applied themselves.
“It was a great effort by the bowlers tonight, we managed to get the ball swinging and we’ve got to make sure we hit the pitch hard and put the ball in good areas and keep creating chances.