Cricket: Surrey coast to victory

ROUND-UP

John Major, suddenly with more time on his hands, quickly found something to do yesterday. After leaving two London landmarks he crossed the river to pop in the The Oval and saw Surrey comfortably beat the British Universities by six wickets with almost 25 overs to spare.

Despite the loss, the students' Will House won the Gold Award. The batsman, who is on Kent's books, hit one six and 11 fours on his way to an entertaining 93 off 92 balls.

The students' bowling attack undid all that and more inside 10 overs. By then Surrey had reached 97 without loss. Only Durham's Mark Chilton, with 2 for 8 from three overs, managed anything respectable with his medium pace.

Alec Stewart lost his opening partner Alistair Brown at 98, with the England wicketkeeper hitting his second half-century in three Benson and Hedges matches this season. He eventually finished on 86 not out having hit three sixes and 11 fours.

Apart from Brown's 47 Stewart received little help from his team-mates and House had had pretty much the same sort of experience when he was batting. Only his Kent colleague, James Ford, with a sturdy 38 gave him any support in the face of some parsimonious bowling with Chris Lewis the pick, returning figures of 8-5-6-2.

Jack Russell , the England wicketkeeper, has escaped punishment from Lord's for his autobiography Jack Russell Unleashed.