Alfonso Thomas hurries Somerset win

Somerset recorded their fourth Championship Division One victory in five outings, beating Nottinghamshire by 10 wickets. The victory, achieved with more than a day to spare, earned Marcus Trescothick's side 24 points and keeps their hopes of lifting the coveted title for the first time very much alive. Resuming their first innings on 278 for 5, Nottinghamshire captain Chris Read, unbeaten on 75 overnight, opened his account with a boundary off the last ball of the opening over - bowled by Charl Willoughby.The left arm seamer had the last laugh however when Read was caught by wicketkeeper Craig Kieswetter for 80 as he pushed forward to the last ball of the 81st over - the first with the new ball. Read added 157 for the sixth wicket with Samit Patel, before being dismissed with the score on 287.Patel reached his century when he edged Willoughby through the vacant third slip area, but in the next over he was out leg before wicket as he played back to a delivery from Alfonso Thomas. Patel scored 104 off 185 balls, including 17 fours and two sixes.Andre Adams brought up the 300 with a boundary through midwicket, but after moving on to 20 he attempted to drive Willoughby and was caught by Kieswetter. Willoughby struck twice more to wrap up the innings, accounting for Paul Franks leg before, and two balls later bowling Charlie Shreck as the visitors were all out for 339.In the morning session Willoughby took four wickets for 26 runs from 6.3 overs to end with six for 101. Trescothick enforced the follow-on, and batting for a second time 178 runs behind, the visitors lost Matt Wood, leg before to Willoughby with the score on one.By lunch the score had reached 28 off 10 overs without further loss - but four overs after the break Alex Hales, who had moved on to 28, stepped down the wicket to Murali Kartik and edged to Kieswetter.In the next over Thomas had new batsman Patel caught at first slip by Trescothick for one and the visitors found themselves 42 for 3. Mark Wagh was joined by David Hussey and between them they took the total on to 93 when Wagh was lbw pushing forward to to Zander de Bruyn for 45.New batsman Ali Brown brought up the 100 with a boundary through cover point off De Bruyn in the 31st over. When Willoughby replaced De Bruyn at the Old Pavilion End, Brown - 16 at the time - gave a chance which Kieswetter, just failed to take diving to his right.De Bruyn's return to the attack paid dividends when he bowled Hussey, shouldering arms, for 30 which brought Read to the wicket. The Nottinghamshire skipper spent eight overs at the crease before he was caught by De Bruyn at deep backward mid-off for four off Thomas.The same bowler then had Paul Franks caught by James Hildreth for one at backward square leg in his next over - and the visitors were rocking on 168 for 7. Thomas struck again in his next over when he had Brown leg before wicket for 47 but the visitors went ahead when Adams edged Kartik through first slip to the boundary.However, the left arm spinner got his revenge when he trapped the batsman leg before in his next over for 10. Thomas claimed the final wicket when he bowled Shreck for three as Nottinghamshire were all out for 190, giving him final figures of 5 for 40 from 14.4 overs.Needing 13 for victory Somerset reached their target in 11 balls, with Trescothick unbeaten on four and Nick Compton five not out, with the remaining runs being extras. Notts picked up five points for their part in the match.

Pushed to the margins, Prior takes centre stage

This has been a week in which Test cricket's merits have been shown in vastly contrasting lights. On the one hand a shocking contest has dribbled to a conclusion in Colombo, with 17 wickets falling in five days at the SSC, including 10 batsmen passing fifty - five of them for a hundred, two of them for a double. At Trent Bridge, on the other hand, consecutive days have passed in which 15 and 13 wickets have tumbled, and all told, 18 batsmen to date have been dismissed in single figures.There's no question whatsoever which of the two contests has been the most compelling, not even at a stage of the Trent Bridge game when only one team has the slightest hope of victory. At 15 for 3 overnight, Ladbrokes are offering odds of 2-1 for England to wrap up victory before lunch on the fourth day, but even if they do so, the effort that Matt Prior put into today's magnificent unbeaten century will not be compromised by the eventual gulf between the sides.Prior has had a rough time of it of late. Through no great fault of his own, he's been pushed to the margins of England's wider squad planning, with Craig Kieswetter's emergence leaving him in limbo in the limited-overs set-up. No-one in their right mind has seriously pedalled the notion that his Test berth is in the same sort of jeopardy, and yet, such is the nature of the England wicketkeeping position, the doubts require almost daily dispersal.Therefore, a superbly combative 102 not out, forged from a position of peril at 72 for 5, was quite some statement of intent. It was Prior's third hundred in 32 Tests, and his first since Trinidad in March 2009, but by the close of play, his satisfaction derived from the manner in which he'd transformed his team's position, rather than the fact he'd logged another statistic in his record-book."I'm not a huge stats watcher, or a stat man," he said. "I got a 93 in my last Test [against Bangladesh at Old Trafford], so it doesn't feel that long ago that I contributed to the team. Whether it was important to show what I could do, I don't know, but I went in in a position when the team needed me to get stuck in, and getting runs for the team was the important bit."In fact, a century could hardly have been further from Prior's thoughts for much of his innings, which began in the midst of yet another of Pakistan's inspired bursts with the ball, as Umar Gul swiped three wickets in four overs to leave his team dreaming of an attainable run-chase. His most immediate concern was to atone for his part in the run-out of Eoin Morgan, and by the time he was joined by the No. 11, Steven Finn, he had a long, long way still to travel, on 63 not out."I don't know what happened there," he said of the Morgan mix-up. "At that time, too many risky runs and singles wasn't the best idea, so it was a bit of miscommunication really. I didn't hear him say yes, he didn't hear me say no, and we ended up looking at each other, with him halfway down the wicket and me thinking: 'Oh my gosh, it's happened again'. It is very disappointing to be involved in a run-out at any stage, especially when it involves arguably your best player of the moment, so I thought I'd best knuckle down here!"Knuckle down he did, with Finn proving to be the most obdurate of allies. While his stonewalling prowess came as a surprise and a delight to a packed Trent Bridge crowd who cheered every step towards England's eventual declaration, Prior himself had no doubt whatsoever about Finn's ability, having witnessed it at close quarters during a rare Championship appearance for Sussex against Middlesex at Uxbridge last week. With Morgan at the other end, Finn had blocked out 35 dot-balls in a 12-over partnership, to save the game with only two wickets standing."It was thoroughly annoying," Prior recalled. "But as he walked to the wicket today, I said something along the lines of 'Same again today please mate!' He did such a fantastic job, not only in the way he played, but what he contributed to the partnership in between overs, in terms of gameplans and all those things. He did all that was expected of him, and more."Regardless of his faith in his team-mate, Prior still had to endure some nervy moments at the non-striker's end, as he crept through the nineties - single by single - with many of his shots coming from the first ball of an over. "My gameplan was to look for twos and fours, but every run counted, I felt, especially when Finny came up to me to say he felt confident at holding up an end. It got a bit frustrating at the end because I wasn't quite hitting the gaps, but I didn't want to turn singles down."That failure to work the angles is the precise reason why Prior's spot in the one-day side has been passed across to Kieswetter, who may lack the subtlety of, say, Morgan, but tends to find the boundaries with a lot of bottom hand. In terms of pure batsmanship, however, there's no comparison between the two men whatsoever. Kieswetter has time on his side and a talent to cultivate, but as a battler who can be backed to produce on demand, Prior's place for the Ashes is utterly non-negotiable."I've batted at six with success, and I've batted at seven, and I feel well placed to do the role in each, as long as we have the right balanced team to win the Test match," he said. "International cricket is all about pressure and how you respond to it. I've not played a day for England as a batsman-keeper that's not been under pressure, but I enjoy and thrive on it, and I embrace it rather than get nervous about it."