There are days when nobody wants to be a batsman, everybody wants to bowl. Yesterday at the Grange in Edinburgh was one of them, as the pace of Durham's attack rescued their second win of the Friends Provident Trophy pool stage, maintaining Scotland's dreadful home record in the competition and undoing much of the optimism created by their victory over Lancashire.

The Durham batting line-up had managed one suicidal run-out and a top individual score of only 29 on their way to a modest total of 181, but the Saltires were never able to come to terms with the hostility of the county attack and were well behind the target rate by the time bad light ended play early.

By then, Gavin Hamilton, a former Durham player, had already established how dangerous conditions really were, misjudging a pull shot off Callum Thorp and edging the ball into his helmet. Several overs later, he was still in obvious discomfort. So when the light started to fail further, the umpires had little choice about calling a halt, particularly with Stephen Harmison firing the ball through the gloom at full pace.

Not that he will have done much to convince the England selectors that they made a mistake leaving him out of the squad to face New Zealand. There was plenty of pace and aggression to his attack, enough short-pitched stuff to keep the Scottish batsmen worried, but predictably a lot of it was wayward, with wides coming at regular intervals throughout his brief spell.

He did claim one of the five Scotland wickets to fall, although it was his brother, Ben, who made the breakthrough when he trapped Ryan Watson, the Saltires' captain, with the last ball of his only over, when he took over after Neil Killeen, who had captured the first wicket, had pulled a muscle. With Callum Thorp also weighing in with a couple of scalps, Scotland were left languishing at 52 for five and were into their tail by the time the umpires began worrying about the conditionsand the result was already a foregone conclusion, despite a spirited bowling performance from the Saltires with John Blain and Glenn Rodgers the pick of their attack as they collected regular wickets.

Most of the Durham batsmen managed to get starts, but none were able to press it home to a big score on an overcast day with the ball swinging for both teams.

Durham
*M J Di Venuto run out 26
P Mustard c Cowan b Nel 5
K J Coetzer c Watson b Blain 7
N D McKenzie b Rogers 27
B W Harmison c Smith b Blain 29
G J Muchall c Watts b Rogers 16
G T Park c Smith b Blain 11
G R Breese not out 25
C D Thorp c Rogers b Weeraratna 13
S J Harmison c Cowan b Nel 3
N Killeen not out 9

Extras (lb 4, w 6) 10
Total (9 wkts, 50 overs) 181

Fall of wickets: 1-16, 2-37, 3-49, 4-76, 5-110, 6-126, 7-134, 8-153, 9-163.

Bowling: Blain 10-1-31-3; Nel 10-0-42-2; Weeraratna 10-0-38-1; Goudie 10-1-30-0; Rogers 10-0-36-2.

Scotland
D F Watts c sub b Thorp 15
E J M Cowan c Muchall b Killeen 5
*R R Watson lbw b B W Harmison 14
C J O Smith lbw b Thorp 0
G M Hamilton not out 5
N F I McCallum c Muchall b S J Harmison 3
J A R Blain not out 1

Extras (lb 3, w 6) 9
Total (5 wkts, 17.1 overs) 52

G A Rogers, J D Nel, S D Weeraratna and G Goudie did not bat.

Fall of wickets: 1-9, 2-30, 3-38, 4-45, 5-50.

Bowling: Killeen 4.1-1-8-1; Thorp 8-2-16-2; B W Harmison 0.5-0-10-1; S J Harmison 4.1-0-15-1.

Umpires: R J Bailey and G Sharp.