Asked for an opinion on cricket in this year's Cricketers' Who's Who, Andrew Gale said that he was “glad to see overseas players back down to one”. Bless him. The 24-year-old from Dewsbury enjoyed a partnership of 169 in 42 overs with Jacques Rudolph, a fellow left-hander, from Springs, Transvaal, one of Yorkshire's three South Africans playing alongside their overseas bowler, Rana Naved-ul-Hasan, of Pakistan.

Gale most admires Marcus Trescothick in cricket and he used his size to bludgeon in a similar manner, while Rudolph was the rapier - until Surrey annoyed him. Usman Afzaal seemed convinced he had him caught at short leg in the last over and celebrated with his team-mates before Nigel Cowley, the umpire, had made a decision. Roused, Rudolph took two steps down the wicket to the next ball and nearly took Afzaal's head off with a drive. But Rudolph was left on 99 overnight.

Rudolph and Gale steered Yorkshire out of trouble, but it might easily have been different. In a match of turning fortunes, Surrey must have hoped they had the aces with their two off-spinners from Pakistan, but on a blameless flat second-day pitch, Mark Butcher, the Surrey captain, could not hold on to two difficult chances at slip off the bowling of Saqlain Mushtaq.

In the second over after tea, Gale, on nine and Yorkshire 163, drove hard and Mark Butcher got one hand on the ball diving to his left. Gale rubbed salt in the wound by cover-driving Saqlain's next ball for four. Then halfway through the evening session, Rudolph on 75 and Yorkshire on 242, tried to run Saqlain to third man and Butcher also got his right hand to a difficult chance.

Surrey took full advantage of their overnight 396 for five. Butcher, though, added only 16 to his overnight 189 to reach 205, his third double hundred and his highest total at The Oval. His stand of 232 in 45 overs with Matt Nicholson for the sixth wicket was the second highest against Yorkshire and Surrey's fourth highest in their history. Butcher clipped Tim Bresnan hard to mid-wicket where Adil Rashid took a good catch.

Nicholson cracked on to 133 off 164 balls, his best first-class score, as Yorkshire continued to feed his cut. But after smashing a drive through Rashid at cover, he was bowled off his pads slightly falling over to Bresnan. Bresnan's figures yesterday morning of 9-3-17-2 from the Vauxhall End were much improved and with Surrey making slow progress Butcher declared, unusually, in the middle of the 120th over. He was perhaps mindful of the forecast for rain later in the week. It was an aggressive move rather than waiting to crawl past 500.

It left Yorkshire with an awkward 20 minutes. Pedro Collins and Jimmy Ormond were off-beam, but Collins trapped Joe Sayers, who has a highest score of 22 in his last 18 first-class innings, in front in the last over before they went off for lunch.

A blistering fifty off 46 balls saw Anthony McGrath, the Yorkshire captain, seize the initiative after lunch. With impressive support from Adam Lyth, the 20-year-old left-handed opener, McGrath took Yorkshire to fifty in the ninth over and reached his own half-century with two flowing back-foot cover drives.

Surrey were guilty of bowling both sides of the wicket. Collins, overpitching looking for the swinging yorker, switched to the Pavilion End, and eventually got one right bending one back to comprehensively beat McGrath, who was leg-before.

The rate slowed against the spinners and Lyth was well caught by Butcher at first slip driving at a full ball in the 29th over to reduce Yorkshire to 123-3.

Scoreboard

Surrey: First Innings (overnight 396-5)
*M A Butcher c Rashid b Bresnan 205
M J Nicholson b Bresnan 133
J Ormond b Naved 10
Saqlain Mushtaq not out 4
M Hussain not out 3
Extras (b 3, lb 16, nb 16) 35
Total (8 wkts dec, 119.4 overs) 466

P T Collins did not bat.

Fall of wickets: 1-41, 2-112, 3-113, 4-121, 5-193, 6-425, 7-454, 8-458.

Bowling: Naved 23.4-5-98-1; Kruis 27-3-98-2; Hannon-Dalby 15-2-58-1; Bresnan 27-4-102-3; Rashid 18-1-51-0; McGrath 7-0-25-1; Rudolph 2-0-15-0.

Yorkshire: First Innings
J J Sayers lbw b Collins 14
A Lyth c Butcher b Saqlain 40
*A McGrath lbw b Collins 54
J A Rudolph not out 99
A W Gale not out 70
Extras (b 3, lb 5, w 1, nb 6) 15
Total (3 wkts, 71 overs) 292

G L Brophy, A U Rashid, T T Bresnan, Rana Naved-ul-Hasan, G J Kruis and O J Hannon-Dalby to bat.

Fall of wickets: 1-22, 2-101, 3-123.

Bowling: Collins 16-2-79-2; Ormond 12-0-58-0; Nicholson 10-1-42-0; Saqlain 23-2-71-1; Hussain 8-0-27-0; Afzaal 2-0-7-0.

Umpires: G I Burgess and N G Cowley.