County Championship: Hashim Amla scores 215 not out as Surrey continue to dominate Hampshire

Hashim Amla and Ollie Pope both made centuries in their 257-run partnership for Surrey's third wicket

Hashim Amla demonstrated his timeless class with an unbeaten 215, while Ollie Pope made 131 as Surrey's dominance of Hampshire continued at The Oval.

Amla and Pope shared a third-wicket partnership of 257 as Surrey closed on 513-3 in reply to Hampshire's 92.

Rory Burns (80) and Jamie Smith (66 not out) also put on century stands with the former South Africa batsman.

Hampshire could only take two wickets all day, those of Burns and Pope, as Surrey built an imperious lead of 421.

The hosts were already in the ascendancy resuming on 131-1 and with a lead of 39 runs but Amla's innings of more than eight hours put them seemingly on course for a big innings win.

By the time bad light stopped play, he had registered his fourth-highest individual first-class knock and passed 200 for the seventh time in his career.

After England Test opener Burns had missed his chance to score three figures under-edging a pull shot on to his stumps off Liam Dawson, his international team-mate Pope made the most of his opportunity.

He brought up his second century of the season off just 139 balls before a well-taken low catch by Brad Wheal at wide gully gave Scott Currie a welcome breakthrough at 413-3.

But the runs continued to flow for Surrey when Smith joined Amla. The right-hander raced to his half-century off just 64 balls and had helped them past 500 by stumps.

Surrey batsman Ollie Pope told BBC Radio London:

"It was obviously a very good day, Hashim was outstanding in the consistency he showed.

"He didn't really change his tempo throughout the day and it was a joy to bat with him and to also watch it from the other end.

"He's a very calming influence to bat with and he also has a lot of wisdom to impart too. I was pretty patient with myself in how I played and also got the rewards too so I'm very pleased with how I went.

"We wanted to be ruthless and bat through the day and we stuck to that and executed it nicely. Hopefully the weather behaves to give us time to finish the job."

Hampshire seam bowler Scott Currie told BBC Radio Solent:

"There's no doubting we're right up against it, but tomorrow's a new day and we've got to keep trying to get something out of this game.

"Stranger things have happened and we'll be giving it our all as we always do.

"The ball did a little bit of the wicket and there were stages where it did beat the bat, but lots of times where it didn't and scoreboard did quickly get away from you.

"From a selfish point of view, it was nice to get the wicket and contribute but it's been a really difficult game for us bowlers so far."