County Championship: Selman builds Glamorgan lead at Northampton

Nick Selman's highest score of the season helped put Glamorgan in a strong position in Northampton

A patient 69 from Nick Selman helped Glamorgan restore their advantage as they lead Northamptonshire by 248 runs going into the final day on 205-4.

Selman added 100 for the third wicket with Billy Root (56).

Their stand gave Glamorgan the impetus to dictate the match, with a declaration possible.

Northants lost wicket-keeper captain Adam Rossington to a hand injury early in the innings.

Early on day three, Northants reduced their first innings deficit to just 43 as they added a further 113 in the opening session for their last three wickets.

Wayne Parnell hit 54 on his debut for the county while Gareth Berg finished unbeaten on 69, his highest score for them.

Glamorgan then got off to a positive start in their second innings thanks to David Lloyd's 38 before Nathan Buck struck twice in successive overs to drag his team back into the game.

Selman, building his first decent score of the season, and the busy Root frustrated the home bowlers in some attritional cricket in the evening sunshine as rapid scoring proved difficult.

Both eventually fell to catches from the stand-in keeper Ricardo Vasconcelos, Berg strangling Selman down the leg-side before Sanderson removed Root.

Glamorgan batsman Nick Selman told BBC Sport Wales:

"It was good to get a few since I haven't scored the runs I would have liked, but I haven't felt too much out of touch and the wicket was good to bat on and get into a rhythm. Hopefully I can build on that for the remainder of the season.

"It's a tough wicket to score quickly on, it's very slow and they bowled well, but it was about keeping in my mind that it was going to get easier and I managed to get a few away at the end.

"We'll look to bat positively and see where we're at. If we can hit the top of the stumps when we bowl, there could be a chance of taking ten poles. The ball's in our court as to when we do declare which is a great position to be in."

Northants coach David Ripley told BBC Radio Northampton:

"Adam Rossington is a bit sore but he has every intention of batting, though we won't send him out to keep and he'll probably have an X-ray on Monday. It looks 50-50 as to whether it's a (finger) fracture or not.

"We need something pretty special from us to win it, or a declaration from Glamorgan that suggests they want to keep the game open.

"It's early in the season so I'd be surprised. It'll be about Glamorgan feeling they've got enough so we can't win and giving themselves a chance to win.

"I'd have thought another 15 overs from Glamorgan (batting), they'll hope to come out and blast us away, we'll hope to bat out the overs on a good pitch and get our eight points."