Wessels counter-attack leaves Northants on the back foot against Worcestershire

Wessels has a storied history of playing against the County, and he penned another paragraph on the second morning at Wantage Road to help give the visitors the upper hand after day two.

His 88 in 78 balls hauled his side to 219 before Northants closed on 90 for four as rain took out the final session.

Wessels has always gritted his teeth a little firmer against the county he was forced to leave in 2010 due to visa issues and whom sacked his father Kepler as coach mid-way through the 2006 season.

It helps that he possesses tremendous ball-striking with which to channel that ire and struck 12 boundaries to give Worcestershire a useful score on another County Ground pitch offering help for the seamers.

Without him, they would have very little after slipping to 84 for five and losing their last five wickets for only seven runs in 30 balls.

Last Sunday, Somerset reckoned that positive play was the only method to succeed and here Wessels followed suit.

Three times he took respectable deliveries from just outside off over midwicket as Worcestershire sprung from 100 to 150 in only 33 balls.

Wessells cut Jack White to third man for his eighth boundary to raise a half-century in 46 deliveries but Saif Zaib’s left-arm spin proved too tempting as he chased a century. He crashed one boundary over mid-on before missing with a second attempted heave.

It ended a stand of 128 for the sixth wicket with Ben Cox, who cut, flicked and pulled Nathan Buck for three of his four boundaries as he made 39.

Wessels’ wicket prompted an extraordinary collapse.

Cox dragged Blessing Muzarabani into his stumps, Ed Barnard, having not scored for 10 balls, ran at Zaib and skied a third catch of the innings to Ben Curran at deep point, Joe Leach was stuck in his crease and lbw to Muzarabani before Dillon Pennington poked the next ball to first slip.

But Worcester had reached a competitive total and when Barnard took two wickets after lunch, Northants were in trouble at 60 for four.

Alex Wakely’s first innings of 2020 brought a half-century.

But only that of balls faced as he scratched around for just nine before slashing at a hideously wide delivery to toe-end a catch high to Wessels at first slip.

Then Richard Levi, like Wakely making his seasonal bow, pushed forward far too firmly and edged to Daryl Mitchell at second slip.

Leach had struck first from round the wicket as Ricardo Vasconcelos, having edged Leach through the slips for four before lunch, pushed at a full ball and this edge carried to third slip where Tom Fell took a smart low catch towards his left boot.

Curran sweetly punched Leach off the back foot for four and then took a confident step down the wicket to whip him through midwicket working the angle.

But he got caught in two minds in dealing with a back of a length ball from Josh Tongue and lobbed a catch to square leg off a top edge. It continued an annoying theme for Curran of looking the part but failing to find runs to firm up the perception.

Wobbling, Charlie Thurston and Saif Zaib settled the home side to tea with a brisk partnership.

Thurston played two very pleasant back foot punches off Tongue among four boundaries in getting to 20 while Zaib’s 19 included pulling Leach over midwicket and into the gardens of the Clarke Road terraces.

Northants bowling coach Chris Liddle admitted it wasn't a great day for the attack.

“They got off to a flier, Riki Wessels took it to us and we didn’t have enough answers," said the former Gloucestershire seamer.

“Over the three games so far we’ve done well as bowling unit until someone has got after us.

"We’ve been working on being smart, setting the right fields and staying relentless in the areas we’re hitting.

“But we broke the partnership and Blessing hit his straps and looked very threatening. I was impressed with the line he bowled.

"It was an attacking line and he didn’t bowl too straight. He’s always going to get bounce because he’s so tall.”

Riki Wessels said: “It was either try and survive and hang around or chance your arm and try and knock them off their lengths. That’s what I did and it worked.

“At 80 for 5, 200 was a long way away but then to get to where we did, we were looking at 240-250 and it was disappointing to lose the tail so cheaply.

“It’s a quick moving game here and you have to make sure you’re in the game for as long as possible and come out the right side of the result.”

Play resumes at the County Ground, weather permitting, at 11am on Monday.