Northeast and Ingram lead Glamorgan to draw at Leicestershire

Sam Northeast's watchful 139 helped anchor Glamorgan to claim a draw

Rothesay County Championship Division Two, Uptonsteel County Ground, Leicester (day four)

Glamorgan 353: Tribe 107 & 342-6 dec: Northeast 139, Ingram 133*

Leicestershire 576-7 dec: Budinger 118, Ahmed 106

Leicestershire (16 pts) drew with Glamorgan (13 pts)

Match scorecard

Glamorgan defied Division Two leaders Leicestershire as Sam Northeast and Colin Ingram led the way to a battling draw.

The visitors started the final day three wickets down and still 92 behind, but patient knocks from the experienced pair of Northeast (139) and Ingram (133 not out) steered them to 342-6 in their second innings.

The pair shared a Glamorgan record fourth-wicket stand against Leicestershire of 225.

The Foxes claimed two wickets in mid-afternoon to revive their hopes but dropped Ingram on 103, and eventually agreed the draw at 16:50 BST.

The match will be remembered for a spectacular maiden first-class century by Foxes opener Sol Budinger, after Glamorgan's Asa Tribe also achieved the same landmark in the first innings.

Glamorgan started the final day on 131-3 after Northeast and Ingram had survived the final session on day three.

They serenely added a further 83 in the morning sunshine with few alarms, as Leicestershire were left ruing Rehan Ahmed's inability to bowl because of a side strain which is set to rule him out of the next match against Middlesex.

With the Kookaburra ball - being used for the first time this season in the Championship - going soft quickly, the key moment was always likely to be the new ball coming five overs after lunch with Glamorgan still four runs behind.

The Foxes turned to spinner Liam Trevaskis with the ball still hard, and he induced Northeast to play an aerial attacking shot for the first time with Sam Wood holding a fine catch running back to long-off.

The Glamorgan skipper, who had hit the county's record of 410 not out on the ground three years previously, had faced 274 balls and struck 16 fours.

Ben Kellaway was caught at square leg by Wood off Ben Green for 14, and Green could have had Ingram on 103 only for Logan van Beek to spill a juggling attempt on the square-leg boundary.

Impassioned appeals for close catches against Ingram and Chris Cooke off Trevaskis were turned down and Glamorgan still had five wickets standing at tea.

Rishi Patel, bowling his off-spin for the first time in county cricket, got rid of the obdurate Cooke for nine.

But first-innings centurion Tribe, who had spent much of the match in bed with illness, came in at eight to make 16 not out and accompany the weary Ingram to the end.

Ingram, who turns 40 at the start of July, batted for more than seven hours, facing 308 balls but striking just 11 fours as he showed his calm temperament and ability to dig in for the long haul.

Glamorgan captain Sam Northeast told BBC Sport Wales:

"Overall we're pleased to come out with a good hard-fought draw. We played some good cricket at times but we had two sessions where we were poor and ended up under pressure for the game.

"We know the Kookaburra ball gets easier so we knew that if we got through that little period (after tea) last night and batted a bit of time then we could build a partnership.

"Colin has been batting for long periods of time for the last two years, he's been brilliant and we had faith he was going to survive.

"It is frustrating after 20 overs with the Kookaburra ball, we thought we'd be able to get more reverse swing and more turn from it. It is a challenge but we've got three more games with it so we're going to have to find out."

Leicestershire coach Alfonso Thomas told BBC Radio Leicester:

"Given the circumstances, with the ball we are using for the game and the pitch as it was, I thought the lads played out of their collective skin.

"After Glamorgan won the toss and were 305-5 at the end of the first day, for us to go into the fourth day as the only team with a real chance of winning was a heck of an effort.

"We maximised the bonus points, but we go into every game trying to win it, and that showed in the way we batted: we dominated with the bat, and that should make our supporters proud.

"With this (Kookaburra) ball you have a smaller window when you can make inroads, and when it's like that, there are either going to be a lot of draws or teams are going to try and doctor pitches to either get a result or at least set a game up."