Surrey 396-5 Yorkshire: Ramprakash misses out again

There were plenty of hundreds to enjoy here yesterday, but the one that everyone had come to see again did not materialise.

It is beginning to look increasingly likely that the hundredth hundred by Mark Ramprakash is going to become more and more of a burden to the Surrey batsman.

This was the third time that he had failed to reach the landmark. He was out in the third over after lunch, getting a short ball from Yorkshire's 18-year-old debutant seamer Oliver Hannon-Dalby which he appeared to splice to Anthony McGrath at second slip.

Disappointed Ramprakash watchers were given a clutch of substitute centuries to celebrate. First there was Mark Butcher, who scored the 38th hundred of his career.

Yorkshire captain Anthony McGrath claimed his hundredth wicket for his county when having Jon Batty caught in the slips, and Matt Nicholson made the fourth hundred of his career just before the close.

By then he and Butcher had piled up an unbroken sixth wicket stand of 203 runs to take Surrey to within a shot of maximum batting points.