County Championship: Liam Dawson bowls Hampshire to crushing win over Middlesex

Liam Dawson finished with 12 wickets and 141 runs in the match

Liam Dawson became only the fourth Hampshire player to score a century and take 10 wickets in a match as he sealed a thumping County Championship win over Middlesex with career-best match figures.

Dawson, who had scored 141 in Hampshire's only innings, took 6-90 in the visitors' second innings of 208 to add to his 6-40 in the first, for match figures of 12-130.

That career-best haul saw him join an exclusive Hampshire club of just 19th-century players Arthur Ridley and Francis Lacey, and Charlie Llewellyn in 1901.

Worcestershire's Jack Shantry was the last to achieve the feat in the Championship nine years ago.

Hampshire's victory, by an innings and 61 runs inside three days, keeps them in the title race behind leaders Surrey and Essex, and further boosts Dawson's Ashes credentials.

It was Hampshire's fourth victory of the season, as they took 21 points, while Middlesex looked destined to drop into the relegation zone with their solitary point.

Resuming at 142-8 in reply to Hampshire's 419, they lost their final two wickets - both falling to Kyle Abbott - within five morning overs.

Tom Helm shouldered his arms to a delivery which swung then seamed into his off stump before Josh de Caires was the victim of more inwards movement that thudded into his pads.

Dawson ended the first innings with six for 40, his best at the Ageas Bowl, bettering the six for 61 he had taken against Northamptonshire in the previous Championship match at home.

Asked to follow on 269 behind, Middlesex survived almost 13 overs second time around before collapsing.

Having been introduced in the 12th over in the first innings, James Vince threw spinner Dawson the ball in the 11th this time around.

He struck in the 13th to start a 21-ball avalanche of wickets, as Middlesex slumped from 40-0 to 51-4.

Dawson induced a leading edge from Sam Robson to second slip and also had Mark Stoneman popping a reverse sweep off his glove to first slip.

In between, Keith Barker had Pieter Malan failing to go through with a shot and toeing to mid-off and Max Holden brashly advancing and edging to first slip.

Ryan Higgins was proactive in dragging his side out of their malaise with regular advances at the spin bowlers and reverse sweeps in his eight boundaries.

He reached a 59-ball fifty in a 78-run stand with John Simpson but fell for 54 when he reversed Dawson to first slip.

Dawson brought up his 10th wicket in the match, for the second time in his career, when Luke Hollman was well caught at wide mid-off by Mohammad Abbas.

It was only the second 10-wicket haul of Dawson's career, after his 10 for 139 against Essex last season. His 20 wickets this season have come at 17.75, half his career average.

John Simpson and Josh De Caires had frustrated Hampshire for just over an hour either side of tea but the unlikely leg-spin of Nick Gubbins produced a delivery Shane Warne would have been proud of to castle De Caires - Gubbins' maiden Championship wicket.

After Simpson fell for 49 when he edged James Fuller behind, Dawson rounded things off when he struck Toby Roland-Jones on the pads and Helm was stumped.

The six-for was the third in a row for Dawson at the Ageas Bowl, having never previously taken more than five wickets in an innings on his home ground.

Report supplied by the ECB Reporters' Network.