Axar Patel disturbs Alex Wakely's timber with an arm ball

Axar Patel is faring well in his debut stint in the ongoing County Championship for Durham. After a brilliant all-round performance against Glamorgan a couple of weeks ago, he continued to bowl well. Northamptonshire was the next opponent for his team and India’s left-arm spinner bowled a dream delivery to dismiss their set batsman in the first innings. However, Durham lost the game by seven wickets thanks to some lacklustre batting as they failed to cross 200 in both the innings.

After being invited to bat first, Durham could only post 129 runs and were bundled out inside 40 overs. Luke Procter was the star for the visitors as he returned with the figures of 5/33. But then Durham needed to bowl exceptionally well in order to restrict the lead of the opposition. Though they couldn’t affect a collapse, the bowlers managed to pick the wickets at regular intervals. But the skipper Alex Wakely was determined and played a vital hand for his team.

Axar’s arm ball stuns the batsman

At 163/4, Northamptonshire were sitting and pretty and looking to take a big lead. But Axar Patel came into the attack and bowled a superb delivery to dismiss Wakely who was batting on 60. He flighted the ball nicely and which prompted the batsman to lunge forward in defence. However, he failed to reach the pitch of the ball and scooted through his defence to disturb the timber.

The dismissal came at the right time for Durham as they stormed back into the contest. Eventually, they skittled the opposition for 198 runs limiting their lead to 69 runs. But the home side’s batting disappointed once again. They could only post 133 runs this time around and set a meagre target of 65 runs for Northamptonshire.

The visitors chased down the total easily in the 17th over of their innings with the loss of three wickets. Wakely, the first innings and the only half-centurion for his team, fittingly remained unbeaten in the middle.

Here’s the video:

Patel's arm ball takes off stump

Live stream: https://t.co/tjzv3ux6Uz

163/5 #ForTheNorth pic.twitter.com/nF0bFF5DSg

— Durham CCC 🏏 (@DurhamCricket) August 29, 2018

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