Danial Ibrahim & Travis Head battle hard on shortened day

Photos: James Boardman

Sussex teenager Danial Ibrahim defied Glamorgan’s dominant bowlers at The 1st Central County Ground as the home side closed a shortened opening day on 161 for 7. In just his second LV=Insurance County Championship match – he scored 55 on debut against Yorkshire a month ago – the 16-year-old made 41 not out in two hours.

Sussex were in deep trouble at 96 for 6 when Ibrahim was joined by Will Beer and the pair put on 65 for the seventh wicket, the highest partnership of a troubled innings, before Beer was out to the last ball of the day.

Sussex were depleted with eight players self-isolating because of a  Covid-19 case within the camp. In addition, Sussex – bottom of Group 3 - were missing the injured Phil Salt and Chris Jordan, while George Garton was away on England duty. Oli Carter, a 19-year-old batsman and wicketkeeper, became the seventh player to make his debut for the county this year.

Glamorgan welcomed back Colin Ingram for his first first-class game since 2017 and Timm van der Gugten, with Marnus Labuschagne and Michael Neser themselves in quarantine.

In damp and dark conditions Sussex chose to bat when play eventually got under way at 2.25pm. They lost their first wicket to the last delivery of the second over when Chris Cooke took a fine catch low down to his right to dismiss Aaron Thomason off van der Gugten for four.

After one ball of the third over the players came off, briefly, because of more rain, as they did again after 11.3 overs, by which time Sussex had progressed to 23 for 2, Stiaan van Zyl having lost his off stump to Michael Hogan for five. By that time the floodlights were in action.

Ali Orr scored a 35-ball four before he was lbw to van der Gugten, and Sussex were 34 for four when Carter was lbw to lbw to James Weighell – a very tight decision - for three from six balls.

But then the sun came out and Ben Brown and Travis Head briefly prospered, with a stand of 41 in nine overs. When Head cut Dan Douthwaite for four to reach 22 it was his highest score of the season. But it was clearly Glamorgan’s session when, just before tea, Douthwaite had Brown caught behind for 22.

Head moved his score to 47, with eight fours, before he was lbw to van der Gugten without offering a stroke and he walked without waiting for the umpire’s decision.

At the close, the Australian said: “I was disappointed not to go on with it but it was nice to get a few runs. I feel I’ve worked hard over the summer.  I’ve been playing all right in the T20s.  I’ve had a good time in the middle in that form of the game.  And I’ve been working hard in the red-ball game. It was nice to spend some time out there. Hopefully the second half of the season will be better than the first half."

Giving Glamorgan's perspective, van der Gugten said: "Ibrahim had a pretty good game plan and he kept to it. They’ve got some good kids down here. It doesn’t happen that often [a batsman, Travis Head, walking for an lbw]. It was maybe doing a bit too much, potentially. But I’ll take that one.  

"Them having won the toss and batted, we would have taken this score at the end of the day. We would probably have bowled first.  Hopefully we can knock over the last three wickets in the morning and get batting.”

Watch highlights of day one here: