IN THE not too distant past, Surrey would have relished a challenge like this. They might even have left Birmingham with an unlikely win. But the not too distant past seems like years ago, and yesterday their season went from frying pan to fire. At 364 for two shortly before lunch, with Mark Butcher and Graham Thorpe reacclimatising comfortably to English conditions ahead of this week’s first Test against New Zealand at Lord’s, Surrey led by 120 and were putting their troubles behind them.

But the second new ball scythed down the last eight wickets for just 50 before Nick Knight’s first half-century of the season ushered Warwickshire home.

Surrey’s annus is not yet horribilis, but their body language is another matter. The champions of 1999, 2000 and 2002 have gone eight championship games without a win — a sequence stretching back to August — and last week were humbled by Ireland’s amateurs in the C&G Trophy. Suddenly, the relegation zone is in sight. Watching from the players’ enclosure, their Australian coach Steve Rixon cut a forlorn figure.

Eyebrows were raised in the close season when it was announced that Jon Batty would keep wicket, open the batting and captain a side full of internationals with minds of their own. He is an affable character and a plucky cricketer, but even Superman might have struggled with a brief like that.

“If there are problems,” said Surrey’s chief executive Paul Sheldon back in April, “we’ll be flexible.” True to Sheldon’s word, Batty dropped himself to No 5, but the real flexibility has been the different ways Surrey have found of throwing it away.

Even so, a corner seemed to have been turned when Batty knuckled down for an unbeaten 92 in the first innings, a captain’s knock that doubled as a plea for patience to his colleagues. The top order duly responded in the second innings, and Surrey resumed yesterday on 243 for two, trailing by just one run. For most of the morning, the aggressive Butcher and the less fluent Thorpe were steering them to safety. Butcher was in one of his languid moods, when the game comes all too easily, while Thorpe mixed characteristically tidy deflections with the occasional miscue. The only bad news for England was that Ashley Giles continued to look harmless on a pitch that was now six days old. A wicket was the last thing on anyone’s mind.

Then, with lunch beckoning, Thorpe drove flat-footedly at the South African seamer Dewald Pretorius and was caught behind for 89, having added 178 in 52 overs for the third wicket with Butcher. It heralded another Surrey collapse. In the second over after lunch, Batty was yorked by Pretorius before Adam Hollioake, his predecessor as captain but still a formidable presence, gloved a snorter from Neil Carter to complete a pair.

Pretorius bowled Butcher off the inside edge to end a sparkling 184 from 331 balls in a shade over six hours, and it was 395 for eight when in the same over Carter removed Azhar Mahmood, driving loosely to first slip, and Ian Salisbury, poking to second. Dougie Brown polished the innings off with two wickets in four balls.

Set 171 in 41 overs to register their first win of the season, Warwickshire signalled their intent by sending out the pinch-hitting Carter to open with Knight. Carter promptly swung Jimmy Ormond over square-leg for six and by the time he was run out in the ninth over, the first after tea, the score was already 47.

After hitting three elegant fours in an over from Bicknell, Mark Wagh played round a delivery from the hobbling Saqlain Mushtaq, but Ian Bell helped Knight add 50 in 12 overs before Jonathan Trott supplied the finishing touches with some muscular blows. For Surrey the post-mortems continue.