Life in the Old Dog

I'm going away for the weekend tomorrow to London and Hertfordshire - beer will be drunk and rugby will be watched - so I made sure I got along to the County Ground in Taunton for the first day of the match against Lancashire yesterday.

Two things stood out - one a mature piece of defiance from the previously peripatetic home-grown all-rounder Peter Trego, and the other a virile spell of new-ball bowling from Andy Caddick which turned the clock back to his greatest days like nothing else he's produced in the last few seasons.

Caddick will be 40 in November but intends to play next season. For a seamer he's old, but all the indications are that he wants it as much as ever. With it looking likely that Somerset will fail to secure the title, Caddick will be pawing the ground when next season starts.

If Wednesday's anything to go by, he'll be worth watching.

Complete Domination

The weather was decent, the three-sided ground was packed and the batting side massacred the bowling from start to finish. But yesterday's events at Taunton were only marginally fulfilling. A match between a weakened Somerset side and what was very nearly a full strength South African eleven was never likely to be very satisfying, and so it proved. The Proteas scored at will throughout the day and only seemed to be at risk from indecision over whether to hit the ball for four or six or the onset of terminal boredom.

This said, there was plenty to admire. Of course, we had Kallis's unrivalled technical mastery, embellished with some uninhibited flamboyance after reaching his hundred, but I also welcomed the opportunity to watch Hashim Amla bat for the very first time.

Like Kallis he barely looked challenged at any stage, and his combination of functional watchfulness, silky timing and, ultimately, complete domination of the bowling, reminded me strongly of Mohammad Yousuf. The beard is pure coincidence.

In the end only a sharp blow on the elbow from a delivery from Andy Caddick could halt Kallis's progress at 160, while Amla was run out for 172.

As I write, they've declared past 500 and Somerset are 58 for 4. There's only one way the game is going and it doesn't favour the home side.

A strong team is warming up well. England watch out.

A Bit of Luck

After a very frustrating, very wet, month I was due a bit of luck and I got it today. With most of the country again being rained on I managed to see a very interesting 74 overs at Taunton in which Northants were bowled out for 221 and Somerset's left-handed openers, Marcus Trescothick and Neil Edwards, motored to 77 off 13 overs by the close.

All Somerset's bowlers - Andy Caddick, Charl Willoughby, Peter Trego, Steffan Jones and Cameron White - bowled some tight lines in helpful conditions and were supported by some very sharp fielding, with Trescothick at slip, and the young South African wicket-keeper, Craig Kieswetter, taking excellent catches.

Prior to Steven Crook's 60 from number 8, the most interesting contribution to Northants' total came from the England under-19 batsman Alex Wakely, who was making his first-class debut. He was unexpectedly tall but showed good judgement and a broad range of strokes in compiling a patient 38.

With rain forecast for Sunday and possibly Monday as well, Somerset will need to push on tomorrow morning to get a decent lead as quickly as possible and get Northants back in.

I'll be there to see them try.

Still Got It

With nothing happening very fast at Chester-le-Street I took myself off up the M5 to Bristol yesterday to see Somerset wrap up a crushing innings win over Gloucestershire to go to the top of Division Two of the championship.

It was an enjoyable day to be a Somerset fan despite the surroundings. I hadn't been there for a few seasons and I was reminded of what a characterless and charmless ground Nevil Road is. The Bristol public weren't exactly breaking down the gates to get in either, and the crowd - containing a substantial Somerset contingent - seemed small, but then the Gloucestershire side was so appallingly bad that you couldn't really blame them.

I left the day with a few lasting impressions, the first of which was the confidence and team spirit of a Somerset side which, in case anyone is liable to forget, finished bottom of the pile last season. It's incredible what a few weeks of consistent run-scoring from Trescothick, Edwards, White, Langer and Hildreth, knitted together with Langer's positive, typically Australian, captaincy, can do.

And then there's the seam attack. The best thing about the day was seeing Andy Caddick clean up the second Gloucestershire innings to finish with twelve wickets in the match. Having taken seven on Saturday he eased himself into his work after his side's mid-afternoon declaration, looking stiff and bowling a little too wide in his first spell, but returning after tea to polish off the innings in conjunction with the equally reliable Charl Willoughby. Even though the most resonant impression was of a man shooting fish in a barrel, it was the sort of afternoon which sent the mind spinning back through the seasons, to the time I first saw him bowl (for Middlesex seconds) in 1989, to his Test debut in 1993, and to the time I stood to applaud him in the Lord's Grandstand as he went through the West Indies in 2000.

At this level, he's still got it (and he had some interesting fields yesterday too).