Durham were left with four runs to chase on the last day after bad light forced the players off the field in their clash against Gloucestershire at Chester-le-Street.
Trailing by 247 after the first innings, Gloucestershire lost their ninth wicket for 211 and were in danger of losing by an innings. Durham, keen to end the game on the third day with light fading, turned to their spinners to end the game quickly. But Gloucs' last-wicket pair of Sai Kishore and James Langridge together added 39 runs to hand Durham four to win.
Gloucestershire, however, refused to bowl their spinners, as per Cricinfo, and the umpires decided that light was not enough for play to continue with quicks bowling and called for stumps. Durham, as a result, were left to chase just four runs on the final day of the contest. The Division Two leaders eventually took six deliveries on the fourth day to complete the chase, with Matthew Potts sent to open to finish the proceedings.
So Durham were close to an innings win against Gloucs, but with the light and forecast bad, bowled spinners to try and finish it tonight. The tail then whacked it to set four to win, and the umps have called stumps due to poor light, even though Durham might only need one ball
— Ben Gardner (@Ben_Wisden) August 29, 2026
Durham remain unbeaten to take big step towards promotion
After putting them in to bat, Durham restricted Gloucestershire to 137, with Kasey Aldridge taking a five-wicket haul in just five overs. He eventually ended the match with nine wickets to his name. Durham, on the other hand, got to 334 on the back of a 126-ball 122 from David Bedingham. Ben Stokes contributed 45, and was dismissed by Sai Kishore - a role-reversal of the first innings.
Gloucestershire did not have the best of starts to their second innings, losing two wickets for seven runs. A 105-run stand between skipper Cameron Bancroft and Miles Hammond got them back into the game, but they kept losing wickets at regular intervals to end up with 250. Sai remained unbeaten on 29, with two fours and as many sixes, while Langridge slammed 36 off 22. Brydon Carse and Colin Ackermann picked up two wickets each.
League-leaders Durham currently sit comfortably at the top of the points table with seven wins from 10 games, while Gloucestershire remained at the bottom with a ninth defeat in 10 matches.
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