A police force has blocked a Babyshambles concert over concern that Pete Doherty, the vocalist and figurehead, might work the crowd into a frenzy. Peter Trego hardly matches Doherty for notoriety, but he delivered plenty to excite during a short, sharp knock played in the anarchic spirit of punk rock.

Rarely can Ian Blackwell have been outscored three runs to one, yet Trego managed just that after tea when he took the game forward, perhaps significantly, with a 39-ball fifty brimming with confidence and the odd moment of audacity. To treat the newball with such contempt was like a sneer at authority.

At the start of the season, Dimitri Mascarenhas could call upon Shane Bond and Chris Tremlett to fire that same weapon but, on a slow, unresponsive pitch, James Tomlinson and David Balcombe offered no such threat. Tomlinson, in fairness, had been far more effective from the opposite end, with the wind behind him, at the start of play.

Trego arrived with the game balanced, Somerset 65 runs behind with four wickets in hand. It took less than an hour before his side went ahead by which time fielders had scattered. Whether dancing down the pitch to Tomlinson, who took eight for 46 in the corresponding game in May, or pulling off the front foot, he had an idea for everything.

Blackwell, like Michael Lumb over the previous two days, toned down his own act, although he was fortunate that an attempt to loft the occasional off-spin of Michael Carberry landed between two converging fielders. A straight six against Tahir proved a relatively rare example of the stocky left-hander on the offensive.

On 96 shortly before close, his mind was doubtless spinning as he pondered the wisdom of attempting a big hit to reach his second hundred of the season knowing that his side needed him there at the close. Tahir kindly answered the question with a full toss that Blackwell smeared with impunity for his ninth four.

Tahir found only slow turn but celebrated his wickets in an extravagant manner that makes him less a “mini-Mushtaq”, the moniker given by John Crawley on television recently, and more a “Pakistani Panesar”. Yet Liam Dawson, having run out James Hildreth brilliantly with a direct hit, lacked the control for Mascarenhas to feel confident of using spin in tandem.

Scoreboard

Hampshire: First Innings 316 (M J Lumb 107, S M Ervine 69)

Somerset: First Innings (overnight 41-0)
M E Trescothick c Benham b Dawson 65
A V Suppiah lbw b Tomlinson 26
Z de Bruyn b Tomlinson 0
J C Hildreth run out 50
W J Durston lbw b Tahir 21
I D Blackwell not out 104
C Kieswetter c Adams b Tahir 28
P D Trego lbw b Tahir 58
A C Thomas not out 19
Extras (lb 8, w 2, nb 4) 14
Total (7 wkts, 107 overs) 385

*A R Caddick and C M Willoughby to bat.

Fall of wickets: 1-55, 2-55, 3-142, 4-150, 5-197, 6-251, 7-339.

Bowling: Tomlinson 25-5-77-2; Mascarenhas 11-4-29-0; Tahir 37-3-125-3; Balcombe 15-2-74-0; Dawson 9-0-53-1; Carberry 10-1-19-0.

Umpires: R K Illingworth and J W Lloyds.

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